Refugee Appeals Tribunal

Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 7 December 2010

Tuesday, 7 December 2010

Questions (203, 204, 205)

John Perry

Question:

204 Deputy John Perry asked the Minister for Justice and Law Reform the extent to which the practice of the Refugee Appeals Tribunal of scheduling appeal hearings at hourly intervals daily — that is, at 9.30 a.m., 10.30 a.m., 11.30 a.m., 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. — is causing wastage of taxpayers’ money, insofar as interpreters and legal representatives who are in attendance at the aforementioned times for such scheduled appeal hearings have to wait in some cases for hours for their appeal hearings to commence and in more cases for the appeal hearings to be adjourned completely, due to the close scheduling of the appeal hearings resulting in previous hearings over running; for the period 1 January, 2010 to 31 October, 2010, the number of appeal hearings that were late starting due to the over running of previous appeal hearings; the amount of time each such appeal was late commencing; the additional cost of interpreters for each such time delay; the number of appeal hearings that had to be completely adjourned by reason of time constraints due to this over-cheduling; the amount of the additional costs to the taxpayer due to the need for those involved to re-attend on new hearing dates; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [46488/10]

John Perry

Question:

206 Deputy John Perry asked the Minister for Justice and Law Reform the reason close scheduling of appeal hearings has continued over the past ten years at the Refugee Appeals Tribunal, despite repeated complaints and requests by legal representatives to change this in order to allow more time between each appeal hearing and accordingly to eliminate additional costs; his plans to request the authorities at the Refugee Appeal Tribunal to change this scheduling procedure, in view of the current economic climate and the emphasis on eliminating unnecessary costs and making savings in all Government Departments; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [46490/10]

Written answers

Minister for Justice and Law Reform (Deputy Dermot Ahern)

I propose to take Questions Nos. 204 and 206 together.

I refer the Deputy to my reply to Questions Nos. 288 and 289 of Tuesday 9 November 2010 which sets out the position in relation to the matters raised by him.

John Perry

Question:

205 Deputy John Perry asked the Minister for Justice and Law Reform the reason an appeal hearing scheduled for 11.30 a.m. on Thursday, 27 October 2010 was adjourned at 1.15 p.m. by the tribunal member due to the over running of a hearing that commenced at 10.30 a.m. in order to facilitate another hearing before the same tribunal member to proceed at 2 p.m., although the 11.30 a.m. appeal hearing was from the Galway refugee legal service office and involved personnel attending the hearing from Galway as well as language analysts from Sweden who had been requested by the applicant’s legal representatives to be summonsed by the tribunal, as opposed to the 2 p.m. appeal hearing, which was from Dublin and did not involve any additional such costs; the additional cost to the taxpayer of this rescheduled hearing, including travelling expenses, subsistence allowance and attendance fees in respect of the applicant, their legal representative, witness and interpreter for a new rescheduled hearing; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [46489/10]

Minister for Justice and Law Reform (Deputy Dermot Ahern)

I refer the Deputy to my reply to Question No. 290 of Tuesday 9 November 2010 which sets out the position in relation to this matter.

Question No. 206 answered with Question No. 204.