The time will come when somebody throws a petrol bomb into a Garda station and a young Garda and two typists get injured. The Garda will get compensation but the two typists will get nothing. That is not right.

I wish to make a point about this section, if I may. I got a ruling from the Chair today that three of my amendments were out of order, which came as a bit of a surprise given that one of them had previously been debated extensively in the House as part of the previous iteration of the Bill.

I find it odd that the amendment is now found to be beyond the scope of this Bill. I will take up the matter with the Cathaoirleach. However, I will say that one of those amendments is very important. The purpose of the Bill is to amend the Judicial Council Bill and there is a mistake in that legislation which needs urgent amendment. I am more relaxed about my third amendment. I want to make the point that these rulings are not in anybody's interests. These are matters which should be dealt with soon.

I just find it strange that on one of the few occasions that I was not here during Committee Stage of the previous Bill, one of the amendments I have tabled here today was debated and the then Minister, Deputy Flanagan, said it was an important issue which he might consider including on Report Stage, and I am now told the issue cannot even be discussed. That is strange.

Yes.

This is an important amendment which I support. It clearly sets out that the selection of persons to serve in judicial office is based on merit, which is in the Bill already, but also "is free from political patronage". Two points occur to me. I do not accept that, for instance, in deciding which of three people should be recommended for appointment to the Supreme Court, the Government of the day is debarred from making a political choice - with a small "p" in the word "political" - in the sense that it could decid…

Briefly arising out of that, I am a bit mystified by some of the provisions of this Bill and I have studied it more carefully. One of these provision is section 42. Section 42(1) provides: The Minister may request the Commission to make recommendations for appointment or for nomination for appointment to judicial office, as the case may be, where— (a) a judicial office stands vacant, or (b) he or she reasonably anticipates that there will be a vacancy in a judicial office. That seems to be discretionary in that the…

Yes, but I am talking about what the Labour Party amendment is about, which is the appointment of people. I am not trying to waste time at all and I will be very brief. Section 51 seems to confine the Government to considering "recommended persons only" but section 42 seems to say that the Minister has a discretion as to whether he looks for recommendations in the first place. I wonder how the word "may" gels with section 51 and what the Minister has just said. Is it to be the case that the Government is to be proh…

I can understand that is the purpose of the Bill. Section 51(1) seems on the face of it to say that a person could be appointed who had been recommended by the commission but was not recommended on this occasion. The provision seems ambiguous and I am interested in that aspect. Maybe we will come back to it later when we discuss the section.

I move amendment No. 2: In page 8, between lines 34 and 35, to insert the following: “ “practitioner representative” means a practising member of the solicitors or barristers profession nominated by the Law Society of Ireland or the General Council of the Bar of Ireland, as the case may be, and appointed by the Minister;”. Amendment No. 2 is in the names of myself and my fellow Independent Senators. Amendment No. 2 is part of a number of amendments, which are now grouped together for discussion. Its purpose is to e…

I will raise two points. First, the suggestion, as Senator Ward pointed out, that the Judicial Council members will somehow represent the diversity of the professions is just not statable as a proposition because the two nominees will be one male and one female nominee, one of whom, at the time of his or her appointment as a judge, will have come from the solicitor’s profession while the other will have come from the barrister’s profession. The Judicial Council could be appointing somebody who has been out of the p…

Senator Ward has tabled an amendment to do that. It is amusing because the Bill, as it stands at present, means there will be a deadlock. The four lay people will obviously listen carefully to the judges as a group. They will not come in say, “We are the lay people, and we have this candidate” and the Judiciary will not say, “Well this is our person”. I believe that the practitioner representatives would tend to assist the lay people rather than the establishment Judiciary in ensuring that there will be an openness…

The Minister has said that it is usual for people to interview for positions. Take the position of a lecturer or professor in a university. It is extremely unusual to say that the only groups of people who cannot be there at the interview board are lecturers or professors. That is what we are doing here. As Senator Ward said, if someone is to be appointed to a medical position, it is extremely unusual to say that the only people who cannot have any input into the decision at all are other medical practitioners. Tha…

I am pressing the amendment.

I move amendment No. 3: In page 10, line 27, to delete “9 members” and substitute “11 members”.

I find myself in the same position as Senator Ward. I find myself put down as a co-sponsor of an amendment that has been proposed for a very different reason by Senator Higgins. I am very happy to co-operate with her in any sensible way but I want to put on the record that my signature to this amendment, and those of my fellow Independent Senators, is for the precise opposite reason to hers. There is a number of things I want to say on all of this. First, the Attorney General is a constitutional officer. The Attorn…

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. The report of the Cregan commission of investigation into the sale of Siteserv Limited to a company beneficially owned in the majority by Mr. Denis O'Brien is a matter of public interest. Siteserv was indebted to the State-owned IBRC to the amount of €156 million arising from its debts to Anglo Irish Bank. Accordingly, the terms on which it was sold concerned the people of Ireland as taxpayers and as guarantors of the failed Anglo Irish Bank. Indebtedness of the order o…

I welcome the Minister and her officials to the House today. I welcome that this legislation is being put before the House. It is a huge improvement on the Bill which was debated at great length in this House before. I should acknowledge that fact. There are a number of issues, though, that I do want to raise. One has been raised by Senator Ward, namely, that in effect, section 52 now says that a person cannot become a judge if a working majority on the commission decides that they will not become a judge. Effectiv…

I welcome the Minister to the House. I wish to make a few observations. The Government's response document and high-level action plan to the Report of the Commission on the Defence Forces commits the Government, over the years 2022 to 2028, to increase the expenditure on defence to €1.5 billion. Currently, it is €1.107 billion. We are, in effect, dealing with a commitment to increase expenditure by €393 million over six years or €65 million per annum.

I heard what the Minister said; I listened in my room and looked at these figures. I looked today at the budget Estimates for next year and noticed that the increase is in fact in the order of approximately 6%. That would be fine, if we were not in a situation where inflation is now running at between 6% and 8%. I want to impress upon the Minister that it is all very well to come to the House and flash figures around but the amount of money provided for in the budget, which received such acclaim the other day, is i…