International Protection Bill 2026: Report and Final Stages Seanad Éireann — 2026-03-25 ============================================================ Patricia Stephenson (SD), Labour Panel Deportations under criminal grounds have taken place. Moreover, we have a handful of anomalies that should not have happened where deportations were blocked, but the domestic courts should be going back to the ECHR and having those proper litigation strategies in place when they do not agree with a decision on those things. Article 8, as I mentioned before, is something that can be looked at with proportionality and it is the one that is blocking the deportations, so it is really important to clarify that again. To pick up on something Senator Mullen said about judges as dictators, that is not anything I am implying. I recognise the relationship between all those things. I recognise the role of elected members, which was mentioned too, in engaging with that. I believe in this idea, which I have mentioned before and which I think the Minister acknowledged, of having proper engagement and political dialogue with the court. That is really important. The Minister said it was not unorthodox but up to this point, the dialogue we have had has only ever been to strengthen it and has never been to weaken protections. We heard that nothing was sacrosanct when it came to human rights. I actually agree, but I believe nothing is sacrosanct because we can always be increasing and strengthening human rights and can always be giving greater protections to humanity and to all people as equals and as individual equals. My challenge to the narrative that it is not unorthodox to have political dialogue and declaration with it has only ever been done to strengthen rather than to weaken. I spoke about positive ways Ireland and other states could engage with the court on the question of efficiency, the clarity of judgments and the consistency in communication of judgments so that there is greater trust in what the court is putting out. That is really important. I talked about the margin of appreciation. These principles have been repeatedly reiterated since the early 2010s and the Interlaken process. They rightly focus on the primary role of states through their elected representatives rather than appointed judges in interpreting the convention in light of prevailing domestic circumstances. This scope to interpret, therefore, actually exists. That is the reality of it. I have promoted the idea of dialogue with superior courts. In order for national courts to fulfil their roles as principal interpreters of the ECHR, the European court needs to work ever more closely with national judiciaries and have that to ensure maximum understanding and coherence. There is also a question around transparency. The entire supervision of the execution of judgments is too secretive and exclusive. That could be a way that we could have dialogue with the court to strengthen what is coming out of it. As I mentioned before, there is also participation with civil society. The ECHR has been amended seven times with additional protocols, but only to extend rights or to add new rights. My point earlier was about the fact that it is unorthodox for this to be the first time in the history of the ECHR to weaken rights. That relates to Article 8, which has a lot of proportionality built into it which would allow for the deportation of criminals, and Article 3, which is an unconditional right. My concern is that we chip away at the integrity of the ECHR for cheap political wins. In times of crisis it is important to go back to where this all came from. Senator Higgins talked about the slippery slope of inhumanity and that might is right. The ECHR was born out of a time when, if you were not a citizen, you had no rights. Your citizenship was the only thing that gave you rights. You did not have human rights as they did not exist. It was only if you were a citizen. The UN Declaration of Human Rights and the ECHR were to give people rights by virtue of being human, after the horror of the Second World War. That is why I am very concerned about attempts to undermine it. That is why I would like to see it built into our legislation. The Government, like all states, is the custodian of the convention. There is no suggestion coming from me that it should not discuss the convention's system fundamentally. The question is whether we believe in the rule of international law and the existing convention. Do we want to strengthen it or weaken it? Do we want to bolster it in a time of crisis or do we want to undermine it? This is not about shutting down debate around human rights. It is about the effectiveness of the system. It is about honest good faith discussions based on facts and evidence and well-established international law. That is what I see as fundamentally missing from the 27 declaration. This is not about political differences; this is about fundamental human rights systems being undermined for cheap political wins. We use the word "fundamental" for a reason. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-03-25/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:46+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-03-25