Barry Ward (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I find myself in a difficult position on this. Although I fundamentally and wholeheartedly disagree with Senator Higgins, I find my name on one of the amendments she has tabled. For her it is consequential but for me it is primary. What my amendment, No. 11, seeks to do is remove the restriction in section 9(3) on the Attorney General having a vote on the commission. I do not think we should be removing the Attorney General from activity by him or her in any future decisions relating to our judges. I spent a lot of time earlier this evening talking about the importance of the involvement of the professions. As the leader of the legal professions in Ireland, the Attorney General is absolutely an appropriate person to be involved in that. The very academics to whom Senator Higgins referred were people I listened to carefully at the Joint Committee on Justice. They are seeking to substantially, if not completely, neuter any political activity in the context of judicial appointments. On the face of it that sounds like a good thing. There should be no politics in the Judiciary. I agree with that but there should be democracy. I have made this point already. There has to be a democratic element in the appointment of judges in this State because they are a branch of government. In a common law jurisdiction, they are particularly important one because they form part of a coterie of people who actually make the law. It is perhaps not in the same formalised way that the Legislature and the Executive do but they nonetheless interpret the documents that come from these Houses and apply them to the law and tell us what they actually mean. They are an important branch of the Judiciary. It is for that reason that, constitutionally, they are a branch of government. It is for that reason that the Government, as the delegate of the people, is involved in appointing those persons. The academics who were referred to seem to totally disagree with that notion. They want to absolutely remove the autonomy of politicians and the Cabinet in making those decisions, notwithstanding the fact that, over generations, those decisions have actually proven to be sound. The people who have made up our Judiciary have proved to be excellent lawyers who have followed the law rather than their own opinions or preconceptions. They have applied the law in an even way, which has benefited this whole country. We have benefited much more than our nearest neighbour, another common law jurisdiction, from a Judiciary that applies the law without fear or favour. I am not saying it is perfect by any stretch or that it has always got it right but we do not see the same level of interpretation in a particular vein in this jurisdiction as there might be in the other common law jurisdictions on either side of this country or the bodies of water either side of it.

What I am trying to do in amendment No. 11 is give the Attorney General a greater role in the process to allow him or her to have a proper voting role. The proposal is that the Attorney General be a member of the commission in any event. It stands to reason to me that he or she would have a voting role in that. Another later amendment of mine would deal with the issue that has been raised in relation to possible tied votes and things like that. There is a myopia to the decision that the Attorney General should not be part of this because the Attorney General is accountable to the Government. The Attorney General is also the law officer of the State. The Attorney General is a professional lawyer. The Attorney General has an insight into what is required of judicial office in a way that very few people on this commission, including the judges themselves, will have. To my mind, it is right and proper that he or she should have a more involved role, not a lesser one. That is why I am bringing forward amendment No. 11.