Charles Flanagan (Laois, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I have made my position clear. The only other point I would make is that a judge is appointed ultimately having regard to consideration on the part of the commission and on the part of the Government and then back for an allocation in the normal way by the president of the court to which the appointment is appropriate. If we followed the Senator's logic, we could have a situation where a judge might be unfairly pigeonholed or unfairly labelled as a specialist in a particular area without reference to other important general or specialist skills of a different nature that might be appropriate in the context of the wider career of that judge, and that would be a concern.

Returning to what I said initially, I am happy that the Bill, under section 50, incorporates the appropriate reference to skill set, attributes, etc., that I would leave the commission engage in the type of deliberation that would be appropriate to allow it make a positive recommendation to Government and that, as we stated all along in this Bill, Government must act in accordance with the constitutional requirement.