The Irish Patriot Act

national | rights, freedoms and repression | opinion/analysis

Saturday May 12, 2007 00:55

by paul o toole

New Law's of the land

Last week in Dail Eireann a raft of new legislation came through. Michael McDoughall drafted amendments to the criminal justice bill. All this happened under cover of election fever two weeks before the government is about to dissolve. The vote was 67 for and 7 against. Where were FG and Labour?, they abstained. Where was the debate-there wasn't any.

The Irish times yesterday on the front page mentioned ...'changes to the right to remain silent' ..It passed through the Seanad un-opposed.

If you were looking for opposition in government there is none on the critical issues.
If society has progressed since the stone age it is in its laws, that this is most evident. Yes we fly planes and carry out heart transplants and flush our excrement away from the place we live, but the greatest achievement that civilisation (I use the term very loosley-believe me)has achieved is its laws.

The right to defend yourself in a court of law-having been accused, the right to face your accusor, the right to bring evidence in your defense, the right to remain silent so not to incriminate yourself, the assumption of innocence until priven guilty. And if all these mechanisms have failed you in your estimation, you have the right to appeal. Before these rights came into being, a king, queen or lord could have your head chopped off or locked up.

This new legislation, in circumstances yet to be defined (you) has literally removed the right to silence. With it goes the presumption of innocence until proven otherwise. What is even more disturbing is the silence from across the chamber floor on the matter.

This is like the patriot act in Ireland, the removal of vast swathes of civil liberties in one fell swoop....and where are the dissenters....silent.

The legislation is actually following what is already going on on the ground anyway. Are we tiptoeing twards a police state?? You couldn't slip a rizla between policy differences in the chamber. The opposition actually supported the measure by abstaining.