John Perry (Sligo-North Leitrim, Fine Gael)
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Question 204: To ask the Minister for Justice and Law Reform the extent to which the practice of the Refugee Appeals Tribunal, in scheduling appeal hearings at hourly intervals daily that is at 9.30 a.m., 10.30 a.m., 11.30 a.m., 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. is causing a wastage of tax payers money, insofar as interpreters and legal representatives, who are in attendance at the aforementioned times for such scheduled appeal hearings, have to wait, in some cases, hours for their appeal hearings to commence and in more cases for the appeal hearings to be adjourned completely, due to the close scheduling of the appeal hearings resulting in previous hearings overrunning; for the period 1 January, 2010 to 31 October, 2010, the number of appeal hearings that were late starting due to the overrunning of previous appeal hearings; the time period each such appeal was late commencing; the additional cost of interpreters for each such time delay; the number of appeal hearings that had to be completely adjourned by reason of time constraints due to this over scheduling; the amount of the additional costs to the taxpayer in having to re-attend on new hearing dates; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [46488/10]

John Perry (Sligo-North Leitrim, Fine Gael)
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Question 206: To ask the Minister for Justice and Law Reform the reason close scheduling of appeal hearings has continued over the past ten years at the Refugee Appeals Tribunal, despite repeated complaints and requests by persons legal representatives to change it, in order to allow more time between each appeal hearing and accordingly to eliminate additional costs; his plans to request the authorities at the Refugee Appeal Tribunal to change this scheduling procedure, in view of the current economic climate with the emphasis on eliminating unnecessary costs and make savings in all Government Departments; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [46490/10]

Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 204 and 206 together.

I refer the Deputy to my reply to Questions Nos. 288 and 289 of Tuesday 9 November 2010 which sets out the position in relation to the matters raised by him.

John Perry (Sligo-North Leitrim, Fine Gael)
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Question 205: To ask the Minister for Justice and Law Reform the reason an appeal hearing scheduled for hearing at 11.30 a.m. on Thursday, 27 October 2010, was adjourned at 1.15 p.m. by the tribunal member due to the overrunning of a hearing that commenced at 10.30 a.m. in order to facilitate another hearing before the same tribunal member to proceed at 2 p.m. when the 11.30 a.m. appeal hearing was from the Galway refugee legal service office and involved personnel attending the hearing travelling from Galway as well as the fact that this appeal involved language analysts witness from Sweden that had been requested by the applicant's legal representatives to be summonsed by the tribunal as opposed to the 2 p.m. appeal hearing that was from Dublin and did not involve any additional such costs; the additional cost to the taxpayer for this rescheduled hearing to include travelling expenses, subsistence allowance, attendance fee in respect of the applicant, their legal representative, witness and interpreter for a new rescheduled hearing; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [46489/10]

Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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I refer the Deputy to my reply to Question No. 290 of Tuesday 9th November 2010 which sets out the position in relation to this matter.