Government Hep C appeal case set for January

A Government appeal against a decision to allow victims to bring High Court claims against awards received from the Hepatitis…

A Government appeal against a decision to allow victims to bring High Court claims against awards received from the Hepatitis C tribunal will be heard in the Supreme Court next month.

The appeal has been brought by the Minister for Health and Children following a decision of the High Court last July that persons who accepted awards from the Hepatitis C Tribunal were not excluded from appealing those awards to the High Court. So far, the tribunal has awarded more than €290 million to Hepatitis C victims. If the High Court decision stands, that figure could rise considerably.

The appeal will be held on January 13th.

The appeal was to have begun in the Supreme Court yesterday but was adjourned when the Chief Justice, Mr Justice Keane, one of the five judges on the bench, disqualified himself from hearing the case.

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He did so after lawyers for the Hepatitis C victim whose action was at the centre of the case raised issues as to whether the Chief Justice should hear the appeal.

Today, the Chief Justice explained his reasons for disqualifying himself. He said he was a member of the Superior Courts Rules Committee which made the Rules of the Superior Courts (Appeals from the Hepatitis C Compensation Tribunal), 1998.

Solicitors for claimants had directed his attention in a letter to the possibility that in making the rules, he might be regarded objectively as having prejudged one of more of the issues which arose on the hearing of the appeal.

Having considered the written submissions and the issues which appeared to arise on appeal, he was satisfied that no such objective view could be formed by any reasonable person.

However, counsel for the claimant had said his client's concern was not merely that there might be a perception of pre-judgment of the issues on the Chief Justice's part, but that there might also be a perception of bias on his part having been a member of the authority which had made the rules which were partly the subject of the appeal. Counsel said that perception might be shared by others who would be affected by the result of the appeal.

The Chief Justice said members of the Superior Courts had been sitting as members of the rule making authority for the Superior Courts as a matter of public duty almost since the foundation of the State. Matters affecting the construction of the rules inevitably came before such judges in the course of their judicial duties.

He knew of no reasonable basis on which any objective person could assume that judges in that position would be automatically precluded by presumed bias or an assumption of pre-judgment from considering and adjudicating upon such cases with appropriate judicial independence.

However, as the matter had been raised and pressed by counsel for the claimant, the Chief Justice said he thought it would be more than prudent that, in the particular circumstances of the case, in the interests of justice, he should disqualify himself.