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weight to the growing lobby of pressure for Par
liament to pass a new Bill of Rights. Several
Private Members' Bills have been introduced, but
have been unsuccessful.
Sir Cyril
said
that Britain's unwritten con
stitution worked admirably, was superbly flexible
and had stood the test of time. But he wondered
if it might not be wise to evolve, not one elabor
ate written constitution but a modern bill of
rights.
He said whether anyone, looking 20, 30 and 40
years ahead, could be so sanguine to suppose
there was no risk to liberty. It might be too late
to build new safeguards then. They must be built
now.
Liberty was not being threatened only by the
unnecessary and
increasing multiplicity of
re
strictions on what a man may do, but by those
who equated it with licentiousness and used it to
trample on the rights of others.
"We are suffering from far too many manifes
tations of this tendency, especially, alas in the
universities," he said. Those to blame were only
a highly vociferous and much-publicised minor
ity. "
Sir Cyril said: "The public at large tend to
get a wholly false impression of the young because
of
the highly-publicised antics of
the minute
minority."
He was convinced there was nothing wrong with
the youth of England." It had never been better
or had higher standards or a great sense of
responsibility than it has today."
Sir Cyril viewed with horror the prospect of
judges being appointed on the recommendation
of a Minister of Justice who might be a career
politician, ignorant of the tradition of the law.
A Bill of Rights might provide that if there was
no Lord Chancellor, judges should be appointed
on the recommendation of a commission consisting
of the Lord Chief Justice, the Master of the Rolls
and the Senior Lord of Appeal.
Courts, he said, should have much wider powers
to control administrative decisions which affected
basic
individual rights. He thought citizens in
conflict with the administration would rather take
their chances before the judges alone.
JURISTS WARN GOVERNMENT
ON INTERNMENT
The Government was warned last night that,
under
the European Convention
of Human
Rights, it could not re-open internment camps
unless
the present public emergency could be
fairly described as "threatening the life of the
nation".
The warning came in a statement by the Asso
ciation of Irish Jurists after a special meeting
of the Irish Council of the International Com
mission of Jurists to discuss the Government's
decision
to provide for the re-opening of the
internment camps.
The Council called on the Government to intro
duce, without further delay, legislation to make
the Convention part of the law of the State, as
Ireland had already done with many other inter
national agreements.
The Council joined issue with the Taoiseach,
Mr. Lynch, on his statement in the Bail that
the European Convention of Human Rights per
mitted the arrest and detention of a person to
prevent his committing an offence.
The Council said: "Article 5 of the Convention,
which provides for such arrest and detention, goes
on to say that everyone arrested or detained in
accordance with
these
provisions
'shall
be
brought promptly before a judge or other officer
authorised by law to exercise judicial power and
shall be entitled to trial within a reasonable period
of
time or
to
release pending
trial.'
"In the light of these important qualifications,
the Convention clearly does not sanction any
resort to 'preventive detention' in the true sense
of internment without trial, save in the case of
dire national emergency entitling a State to de
rogate from its obligations under the Convention."
The Council conceded that there could be cir
cumstances where the ordinary machinery for the
enforcement of justice broke down, and where
interment without trial would have to be resorted
to.
The Council added that it was emphasised that
"this measure is foreign to the whole principle
of the Rule of Law and should only be availed
of as a last resort in circumstances where the
freedoms guaranteed under the democratic system
are being used
to
undermine and
overthrow
democracy itself and to substitute for it a state
of anarchy or an oppressive and autocratic regime.
"Without having before it the information avail
able to the Government, the Council could neither
condemn nor approve the statement of intention
of the Government, but urges orthodox means
of law enforcement until they were clearly seen
to be inadequate to protect the community".
The Council laid great stress on the solemn
undertaking by the Irish State when signing the
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