This is really the kernel of the second purpose of the Bill. It has been decided to spell beyond doubt the exact powers of the commissioners in the area of selecting candidates. I think this section seeks to do that by inserting criteria which were previously used in the Civil Service Commissioners Act, 1956. There are two points I want to make arising out of the section.
It is clear both in what the Minister says and in subsection (2) (b) that the appointments will be by competition. It is stated that the competition shall, as the Commissioners may decide, consist of any one of the following: interview, written examination, practical examination or any other test. I do not have the benefit of the actual report of the Supreme Court but I am depending for the moment on the Minister's statement in Second Stage in which he said that the Supreme Court decided that the Commissioners acted beyond their powers in granting extra credit for knowledge of Irish to candidates being selected. To do that it is obvious that the Supreme Court must have inquired into the method that was used for determining the success or otherwise of the particular candidate. Obviously the Supreme Court decided that it was a competent body to subject to scrutiny the methods of appointment and methods of assessment used by the commissioners.
The method of selection we are proposing here could, in due course, be subject to scrutiny by the High Court and ultimately the Supreme Court in a case brought under the new subsection (3). I presume no difficulty will arise if the commissioners can vouch that the way in which they arrived at their conclusion was by way of written examination or by way of a practical examination but if it is by way of interview how would the commissioners report to the court on a competition of interview? It appears to me that that is what they would have to do. The Supreme Court have said: "We are going to look at the way in which you conducted the test or the competition". One of the ways in which you can have a competition under this new legislation is by interview. Therefore, would we have a situation where a person who felt aggrieved could go into the High Court and say, "I do not believe that the interview was conducted fairly and I do not believe that I should have been given less marks than somebody else". In order to prove that that was not the case, would the Local Appointments Commission have to put before the court the scheme that they used for marking one interviewee over another interviewee? Is that what it means? Because if it is, it appears to me that it would be a very difficult thing to do. Therefore, I ask the Minister if he is satisfied that a secision by the Local Appointments Commission to use an interview type competition will not give rise to difficulty, should the result of that interview be questioned in the courts.
