I have a fundamental reservation regarding the provision contained in the amendment. Perhaps the Minister might further clarify its purpose? Solicitors employed by law centres should not be civil servants. It is wrong that they should be categorised thus, they should operate independently.
I have difficulty seeing how one can provide equal access to justice where people who can afford it can get legal advice from a solicitor who has no duty of any nature to the Government of the day or to the Civil Service, and people who cannot afford to pay for legal advice get legal advice from someone who may, ultimately, as a result of this legislation, be classified as a civil servant.
Real occasions arise when the rights of the individual citizen might be at variance with a position taken by the State, the Government, a Minister or a Department. A simple example is the quagmire of dealing with the Department of Justice in relation to applications made by persons, who are non-citizens, for political asylum. An extraordinary ineptitude has been shown by that Department through a succession of Governments in dealing with those applications, which has resulted in a number of court cases to protect the rights of individuals seeking political asylum or citizenship.
Citizenship is another area of difficulty. Any non-citizen living in this country who applies to the Department of Justice for Irish citizenship may, if they are lucky, have their application dealt with speedily or, as is frequently the case, may discover their application disappears down a black hole for three, four or five years. They never know the reason for the delay or if they are refused citizenship they do not know why.
What is the position for an alien in this country who seeks political asylum or someone living in this county and seeks Irish citizenship, and who may resort to legal aid? If the solicitors this person is dealing with are designated as civil servants under what direction will they be? If the Department of Justice disapproves of claims being brought on behalf of people seeking citizenship or political asylum by law centre solicitors representing them, what will happen? To secure the independence of the solicitors operating in the law centres a Chinese wall should be built between them and the agencies of the State because there will frequently be a clash between the two.
Other issues which have been debated in the Seanad will arise again; for example, the exclusion of social welfare appeals from this Bill which is a major issue and the continuing exclusion from legal aid for those who are in dispute with regard to their entitlements to social welfare. A classic example of a major dispute is the claims made by large numbers of married women that they did not get proper unemployment payments in the 1985 to 1986 period based on equality principles. That was a major clash between the Government and the State.
I have not been so enraged for a long time as when I read a report in yesterday's Irish Independent in which a Government spokesperson wondered why any woman seeking an equality payment should need a solicitor when the Government had announced this year that it was making the payments. It has taken a ten year legal battle to get the Government to acknowledge its obligations in this area. That is to the shame of previous Governments in which Fianna Fáil was the majority party, but, in fairness, the problem was partly created by Fine Gael and the Labour Party in Government in the 1985 to 1986 period. Fine Gael, the Labour Party and the Democratic Left now in Government are now largely resolving the problem.
However, the Government statement to the media wondering why anyone claiming an equality payment would want a lawyer is almost laughable when there had been a ten year legal wrangle. There are still entitlements in the system that the State is not fully acknowledging in the payments being made this year. That is still part of a wrangle; it is another issue to which I intend to return.
We should be clear that in this country individuals have certain constitutional rights and protections to which they are entitled by legislation. They frequently come into conflict with the State or its agencies. Those who can afford legal advice have no difficulty getting it. I do not understand why we need to designate the solicitors in the law centres as civil servants when, as I understand it and I am open to correction, the solicitors who operate in the law centres at present are not so designated.
Perhaps I am wrong in that regard and the Minister will clarify the point. It is my understanding they are employed as solicitors, they are independent and they have practising certificates which they get annually from the Law Society. They are not in anyway, notionally or practically, subservient to any State Department.
The Minister may tell me they will be nominated by civil servants but that there will be no interference. I am concerned about the ethos that might develop in future years within that group of people who see themselves as civil servants. I am concerned that over a period of time they may not see themselves as being independent of the Government. It is of great importance that they are and, in so far as this amendment gives us an opportunity to further tease out this position, I would be interested in the Minister's response.
