Government accused of filleting Judicial Appointments Bill through own amendment

Amid strong criticism of Transport Minister Shane Ross, who has spearheaded this bill, the Government called time on the bill in the Upper House by 25 votes to 23.

During somewhat tetchy exchanges with Senators, Justice Minister Charlie Flanagan moved an amendment which reinforced the right of the Government to appoint judges without the need to seek approval from this new Commission.

Senators Michael McDowell, Ivana Bacik and David Norris said this amendment represented a “filleting” of Mr Ross' pet project and made them ask what have they been debating for a year and a half.

“It is a monumental u-turn to save this bill,” said Senator McDowell.

“It's very clear that the attorney general's advice on the stage of the bill as it will be amended by this means that the government of the day is perfectly entitled to appoint any eligible person to be a judge of the Superior Court without recouse to the Commission,” he said.

“It means that this whole process is largely redundant, and that the, the serving members of the judiciary in particular, but any other eligible person can be appointed by the government of the day, simply by doing so, and the Judicial Appointments commission can be totally bypassed,” Senator McDowell said.

“So what was this all about? Why were we kept here debating this for so long? And the answer is that one man's vanity had to be appeased,” he said.

Mr McDowell, himself a leading Senior Counsel, described the bill as a “vanity project” of Mr Ross and said Mr Flanagan's amendment made a mockery of Mr Ross' promise to end the cronyism of how judges are appointed.

As a result of the amendment, he said the new Commission at a cost of €500,000 would become an expensive quango.

“What have we been spending time on this grotesque act of politcal fraudulence,” he said sharply.

“After a year and a half or whatever it is in this house. A climb down and a surrender. And the minister said that he doesn't engage in left turns, while he's engaged in the most massive U turn to try and save this bill to try and save this from a charge of unconstitutionality,” he said.

In a somewhat jocular tone, Senator Norris paid tribute to the minister's ability to gut the bill proposed by his Independent Alliance government colleague, Mr Ross.

“The whole intention of minister Ross was to limit the power of government. This amendment from the minister says nothing is in this act should be construed as limiting the power of the government. Well done. Congratulations,” he said.

“There goes Charlie, and you've done a damn good job minister, you filleted it, you destroyed the Ross bill,” Senator Norris said amid much laughter in the Upper House.