Lynn Boylan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It is another day and another year and I am back to raise the issue of the Stardust inquest. The last speech I made last year was to implore the Minister to give clarity to the families about where the inquest would be held. Nobody in the Department had the foresight, knowing the contract would end in October, to find an alternative human rights compliant venue. It is now the middle of January and the families still do not know where the inquest will be held. What has come to light in the preliminary hearings today is that the State is putting it to the families that the inquest should be held by a judge with no jury, effectively like the Special Criminal Court. The families at the inquest will have to go in and have their case heard by a judge because the State refuses to pay a jury.

This will be the most significant and longest-running inquest in the history of the State. It is the most significant inquest that will ever be held and the State will not pay the jury. How can we expect jurors to come in and give up at least a year of their time to hear what happened on that night and do it for nothing? In recent weeks, the barrister representing the families asked the Department of Justice to write to the courts and request permission that the Juries Act would be extended to the Stardust inquest. This will not be done. The Minister has said the Department is not prepared to do that.

Once again the families of the Stardust fire are being treated with absolute contempt by the State. The families have gone through four decades of contempt. A total of €1.5 million was spent on a venue that was hardly used. Now the families are told they are not worthy of having a jury paid to hear the case and they have to be dealt with in an inquest held by a judge. If the Minister, Deputy McEntee, is not prepared to write to the courts and ask that the Juries Act be extended to the Stardust inquest, I will bring legislation to the House to plead that the families be treated with the respect and dignity they deserve.