Allowing that some Court of Appeal or High Court judges may be on the shortlist, rather than just ordinary members of the Supreme Court, six or seven members of the Supreme Court will be excluded from eligibility to be appointed Chief Justice at the hands of the Government if such a vacancy arises. One cannot, as is the case now, at Cabinet state that Ms Justice so-and-so is being appointed to the Supreme Court, that creates a vacancy in the Court of Appeal and that the Cabinet will appoint A or B to fill that position, that she happens to be a High Court judge and that the Cabinet will fill that as well and there is a shuffle upwards of positions.
Key terms by TF-IDF across 4,812 words from 9 speakers. The summary quotes the highest-scoring sentences verbatim — nothing is paraphrased.
Tellers: Tá, Senators Seán Kyne and Lisa Chambers; Níl, Senators Michael McDowell and Gerard P. Craughwell.
| Question | Result | Tá–Níl |
|---|---|---|
| Amendment put: | Lost | 4–19 |
Party shown is the one each member held on 2022-11-15, frozen by a dated join — not their party today. The Oireachtas API publishes no date of birth and returns an empty gender field for every member in this period, so no age or gender breakdown is shown.