Feargal Quinn (Independent)

I welcome the Minister, the Bill and the effort to ensure there is respect for legislation. I was in the House in 1993 when the Criminal Justice Act 1993 was passed. Repealing section 5 is clearly necessary because there is a danger that the respect on the side of victims is in danger of being damaged. This Bill will end the ban on retrials of those acquitted even where important evidence emerges about involvement in the offence. I welcome the fact the DPP can order a retrial where the original prosecution was "tainted", a very good word that had not occurred to me, due to the intimidation of jurors or witnesses or where it emerges a witness committed perjury. In addition, the DPP can apply to the Court of Criminal Appeal to seek a retrial in cases where a trial judge has given a mistaken ruling on a point of law, leading to the acquittal of an accused person. These are the points that disturbed victims and brought law into disrepute. The proposed legislation will provide for a number of exceptions to the standard convention of international law that an accused person cannot be tried twice for the same crime. This is double jeopardy.

I had not realised the differences in many cases between civil and criminal law. I thought of the OJ Simpson case in the US but also the civil case in Northern Ireland, which reminds us of the double jeopardy rule that could apply. The Bill will also reform rules on the use of victim impact statements in trials and expand the range of persons who can make a victim impact statement in court to include the relatives of murder victims. Judges will be allowed to impose bans on the broadcast or publication of all or part of those statements.

I welcome the part of the Bill that allows the DPP to reopen cases concerning offences that carry a mandatory or potential life sentence. That is a necessary change. If new, reliable evidence comes to light that implicates the person concerned with a high degree of probability after the trial, the opportunity for justice should not be passed up. I am concerned at the changes to the delivery of victim impact statements. Calls for reform of the legislation governing victim impact statements were made after those several instances to which I referred, including one where evidence that did not come out at the trial was conveyed in the victim impact statement. I will not refer to the specific case but we know what we are talking about.

This Criminal Procedure Bill repeals section 5 of the Criminal Justice Act 1993, to which I referred, which currently governs the use of victim impact statements and substitute and alternative frameworks. The category of persons allowed to make such a statement is extended to the family of the deceased - a parent, guardian or other person acting in loco parentis where the victim is a child and unable to give evidence - or a family or guardian of a victim who has a mental disorder and is unable to give evidence.

In addition, the general scheme sets out the boundaries for publication or broadcast of a victim impact statement. I read a recent article by Ms Deirdre Duffy, entitled "'Balance' in the Criminal Justice System: Misrepresenting the Relationship between the Rights of Victims and Defendants", which appeared in the Irish Criminal Law Journal. She indicated that guidance is required on the weight to be attributed to a victim impact statement and it remains unclear who has responsibility for the victim impact statement. She makes the point that it is not apparent who should guide the victim through the preparation of the statement. The problems posed by victims who stray outside the boundaries of the victim impact statement are not addressed.

Having learned the lessons of past use of the victim impact statement, I am concerned about these drawbacks, particularly that the boundaries of the statement are not addressed. I suggest that certain constraints to the statement be firmly set down in the Bill. Perhaps there is a need for an amendment to the Bill in this regard on Committee Stage.

It must be remembered that diminishing the rights of the defendant will not advance the rights of the other side, and both sets of rights must be protected in full in terms of European law and international rights. Ms Duffy states:

It is clear from the overview of European and international human rights standards that the advancement of the rights of crime victims can be achieved without restriction on defendants' rights. Legitimate reforms to the victim impact regime have been plucked out and tagged on to a host of criminal procedure reforms in order to dress up a package of measures as victim-centred.

I mention this quote because it is necessary to draw attention to the matter.

With this Bill it seems we are tampering with fair trial rights founded on our Constitution, as Senator Bacik referred to. I am reluctant to support it wholeheartedly until the Minister of State is able to put my mind at rest with regard to the area of which I spoke. The legislation certainly is needed and we must act on it. The main objective of this is to ensure the law is held in high regard. If this has not happened, it is because these flaws in this area have yet to be looked at.

Senator Bacik referred to some of the new technology being introduced, such as DNA analysis, which enables more evidence to come about at a later time. It would be a shame if we could not use that technology which enables us to discover something we did not know when a trial originally took place. It would provoke frustration and outrage in victims who could feel that evidence has come out but not been used because the law as it stands prevents this.

I welcome the tenor of the legislation and its objectives. On Committee Stage we, along with the Minister, should cover any of those areas that elicit concern.