GOVERNMENT PLANS to amend the Constitution to allow politicians carry out inquiries will trample on the rights of citizens by denying them the protection of a review in the courts, according to the Bar Council.
The council, which represents more than 2,300 barristers, is urging No votes in next week’s referendums on political inquiries and on judges’ pay.
The so-called Abbeylara amendment would allow the Oireachtas to carry out inquiries into matters of public importance and to make findings of fact about a person’s conduct. Currently, this is not possible, due to a court judgment relating to an Oireachtas inquiry into the shooting of John Carthy in Abbeylara in 2000.
The council says the amendment would leave citizens who were subject to inquiries unprotected against attack from the State by removing the oversight of the courts.
At present, anyone aggrieved about fair procedures at a public inquiry can challenge decisions before the courts. The council says that under a new system the Referendum Commission has said it can not say definitively what role the courts would have in reviewing the procedures adopted.
The council says it does not believe it is appropriate that members of the Oireachtas, with their interest in political issues, should be allowed to make findings of fact about the conduct of individual citizens.
Tribunals were first introduced because people did not have confidence in politicians to adjudicate on important issues, it says.
The council says that since 2004, cheaper and quicker commissions of investigation have been available as an alternative to tribunals.
“The Bar Council believes that these concerns are real and justified. The case in which the right to fair procedures was first articulated by the courts, the Re Haughey case of 1971, was a case in which the Supreme Court held that a parliamentary committee had trampled on the rights of the citizen.”
Last year, the High Court found a parliamentary inquiry had breached the rights of Senator Ivor Callely during an investigation.
“It is deeply disturbing to think that if this amendment is passed the citizen aggrieved at his treatment by Deputies or Senators in an inquiry in which his rights are at risk will not be afforded the opportunity to vindicate his or her rights before the courts.”
On the judges’ pay referendum, the council describes the proposed wording as vague and imprecise.