Michael McDowell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I refer to what Senator Norris said about weekend journalism. Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never harm me. I would like to remind the Members of the House of some of the things that have happened in this debate thus far, apart from the GRECO report and its non-publication, to which I will return. We should remember that the origins of this legislation predate the emergence into a position of political leverage of the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport.As I understand it, the Department was working on legislation along these lines well in advance of his accession to the Cabinet so it is unfair to say, and I do not make the charge, that this Bill is entirely his creation or that the fact that we have this legislation is entirely his doing. The record shows otherwise. The record shows that as far as back as the former Minister for Justice, Alan Shatter, work was being done on a Bill along the general lines of this legislation to replace the Judicial Appointments Advisory Board which, as I have acknowledged, had deficiencies in the way it operated, particularly in respect of the District Court where it was overwhelmed with applications and had no real means of vetting them very carefully or coming to any detailed knowledge as to the merits or demerits of any particular applicant. I am not trying to attribute responsibility for this legislation to the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport or anybody else. It was coming anyway. Bringing this legislation through was part of the Department's long and short-term agenda.

Again, prior to the inclusion of the Independent Alliance in the Government, there was quite a detailed interaction between the Government of the day and the Judiciary in which the Judiciary expressed its views about the inadequacies of the Judicial Appointments Advisory Board system and the way it worked.