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GAZETTE
N E W S
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 1994
Semi nar on European Conven t i on on
Human Rights
by Dr G Quinn, UCG Faculty of Law
Ireland and Britain and, possibly,
Norway are now the only countries in
Europe not to have absorbed the
European Convention on Human Rights
into their domestic legal orders in some
form or other. This was one of the many
interesting issues that emerged during a
recent seminar on the European
Convention on Human Rights which
was held on October 30, 1993 in UCG.
The UCG Law Faculty is host to the
Irish Centre for the Study of Human
Rights. The seminar was formally
opened by the Minister for Justice, Mrs
Maire Geoghegan-Quinn,
TD, and was
presided over by the Hon. Mr Justice
Geoghegan
of the High Court. The
event itself was co-sponsored by the
Council of Europe and the Irish Centre
for the Study of Human Rights. It was
attended by well over a hundred
lawyers, students and members of other
interested voluntary groups from all
parts of Ireland, north and south.
Several points raised by the various
speakers are worthy of note.
In her opening address the Minister
noted the overall track record of Ireland
under the Convention, Ireland was the
first country to accept the right of
individual petition to the Court. She
adverted in particular to her duty as
Minister for Justice to conscientiously
respect and enforce the judgments of the
European Court and cited the recent
Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act
which enforces the
Norris
decision as
one case in point.
Three senior Council of Europe
officials, led by
Giuseppe
Guameri,
presented detailed papers concerning
the political background to the
Convention and the machinery and case
law of the European Commission on
Human Rights and European Court of
Human Rights. The addition of many
new East European democracies as
parlies to the Convention and the
increased popularity of the Convention
At the Seminar on the European Convention on Human Rights were l-r: Lisa Seldon.
UCG; Donncha O'Connell. UCG; Stephen Livingstone. QUB; Karen Reid,
Secretary,
European Commission on Human Rights; Giuseppe Guameri. Head of Commission on
European Human Rights; Maire Geoghegan-Quinn,
Minister for Justice; Peter Kempees,
European
Court of Human Rights: Dr. Gerard Quinn. UCG; and Professor
Liam
O'Mallev, UCG.
among Western European citizens, has
led to profound pressure on its
machinery over the last few years.
Some ten thousand applications are now
registered and outstanding with the
Commission which is causing many
years of delay. In response to this
pressure the combined Heads of Slate of
the member States of the Council of
Europe (which now encompasses thirty
two States) decided recently at their
summit in Vienna to merge the
European Commission with the Court.
Toward this end it was also formally
decided to prepare a protocol to the
main Convention which will be opened
for signature next year. The new unified
Court will total thirty two judges in all
and will sit in chambers to combine the
functions of the former Commission
and the Court. The Commission is
likely to survive for a while beyond the
creation of the unified Court in order to
clear the backlog of registered
applications.
In addition to the Council of Europe
presentations there were other talks
given by various speakers on a panel
dealing with the relevance of the
Convention in Ireland.
Steven
Livingstone
(QUB School of Law) and
Donncha O'Connell
(UCG Law
Faculty) spoke about the Irish cases that
have been decided at Strasbourg.
n
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