A prominent TD has said it is “extremely disappointing” that the Dáil refused to allow her to question Health Minister Stephen Donnelly on whether it is an offence to attend Mass.
Laois-Offaly deputy Carol Nolan was seeking clarification because the minister previously told the Dáil it was not an offence, but the State is now arguing in legal proceedings that it is a penal offence carrying a fine.
The Irish Catholic revealed last week that the Ceann Comhairle, Seán Ó Fearghaíl, disallowed the query saying the matter is before the courts, but also because “requiring the minister to provide an interpretation of the law” is not in order as per Salient Rulings 696 and 697.
“I recognise the importance of the separation of powers, but the reply from the Ceann Comhairle is one in which a particularly expansive view of that principle was adopted,” Ms Nolan told this paper.
“It also highlights the need to radically revise the continuing application of the precedent whereby I, as an elected member of the Oireachtas, am forbidden to ask a relevant minister to clarify an aspect of the law through written parliamentary questions but am entirely free to raise the same issue on the floor of the Dáil where I would receive a reply,” she said.
She said that there’s a “tension” and “contradiction” here that must be resolved.
Meanwhile, Trinity College law professor David Kenny, said that “it’s a stretch” to suggest that the rules mean that you “can’t debate any law that is subject to an ongoing court case” as it is “far too severe a restriction on the powers of debate in the house.
“Because even if you think it through, if a court case began and it showed up a very problematic aspect of a law, the argument that the Ceann Comhairle made here would suggest that the house can’t debate changes in that law unless and until that court case is finished,” Dr Kenny said, continuing, “which couldn’t be true.”
That would constitute “a crazy restriction on the powers of parliament,” he said.
Michael McNamara TD of Clare said that the situation was “worrying” to him and that “if you can’t go to court to get an effective remedy,” and “you can’t have your democratically elected representatives raise it in the Dáil, well then what can you do?”