Bad court decision for asylum seekers
Monday 31 July was another bad day for justice and human rights
in Ireland. A Supreme Court judgement held that the Minister for
Justice does not have to give any further reason for rejection of
an asylum seeker's plea to remain in the state on humanitarian
grounds than the fact that the original application and appeal
for asylum had been rejected by the Appeals Tribunal.
The Tribunal is a departmental body, appointed by the Fianna Fáil
minister, John O'Donoghue, to adjudicate claims to asylum. It is
not a court of law, with established practises of sworn evidence
from witnesses. Still less is the tribunal a court of law where
the right to trial, or adjudication, by a jury of your peers,
exists. The adjudication is often a matter of life and death for
someone seeking asylum, who believes that persecution, torture,
and death may result on return to his or her native country.
The head of the Tribunal, Peter Findlay SC, resigned from his
position 18 months ago, saying that the system was a ``travesty of
justice'' and constituted denial of the rights of asylum seekers.
The case brought by three asylum seekers before the Supreme Court
last Monday relied heavily on the 1999 Refugee Act, which
specifies that the minister must not only notify an asylum seeker
of the proposal to deport him but also of ``the reasons'' for the
order. And ``reasons'' is plural.
The refusal of application and the rejection of the subsequent
appeal is only at best, one reason. The Act requires that more
than one reason be given.
As it is, the asylum seekers who were notified of proposed
deportation were told, in a standard letter, that ``the reasons
for the minister's decision are that you are a person whose
refugee status has been refused, and... that the minister is
satisfied that the interests of public policy and the common good
in maintaining the integrity of the asylum and immigration
systems outweigh such features of your case as might tend to
support your being granted leave to remain in the State''.
There are several disturbing features of this judgement. There is
the absence of transparency in the decision process and there is
the fact that to all intents and purposes, asylum seekers may
actually be sent to their deaths, without knowing the reasons
why. They also do not have the equal right of other people in
this state to a trial or adjudication by jury, in a court of law.
Even more disturbing is the reference to ``the interests of public
policy and the common good'' in the standard letter sent to those
to be deported. If there are two reasons given in the letter, not
one, then if the first is the fact that the tribunal has rejected
the asylum seeker's application and appeal, then the second is
that it is in the ``common good'' that he or she be deported and
the tribunal's decisions respected.
``The reasons'' for the minister's rejection of an asylum seeker's
claim to remain on humanitarian grounds reduce to firstly that
the tribunal has rejected the asylum seeker's application, and
secondly, that where this is the case, to maintain the integrity
of the asylum process, this rejection must be upheld. This
amnounts to no additional appeal based on humanitarian grounds
whatsoever.
Monday's decision undoubtedly reinforces existing discriminatory
treatment of asylum seekers in that they are not accorded equal
rights to other people living in Ireland. This discrimination is
evidenced clearly in the direct provision policy; the denial of
the right to work and to education, which are internationally
recognised human rights to be accorded to all. It is now also
evidenced in the unequal right of access of asylum seekers to the
court of appeal and the justice system in this country.
The case before the Supreme Court has held up hundreds of
deportations. They will now proceed, irrespective of whether
there is any safe place for a deportee to go to, irrespective of
whether anyone cares.
Monday's judgement, in the interests of what Minister O'Donoghue
holds to be the ``common good'', is a disturbing ruling indeed.