Publishing Guide

Upcoming Events

National | Rights, Freedoms and Repression

no events match your query!

New Events

22 Mar [Dublin] National Demonstration for Palestine: End...

more >>

Other Press

Rights, Freedoms and Repression

Woman whose soup run fed 250 homeless in Dublin told to cease or face €300k fine 21:35 Feb 07 2 comments

Germany cannot give up it's Nazi past - Germany orders Holocaust survivor institutionalized over Cov... 23:31 Jan 14 1 comments

Crisis in America: Deaths Up 40% Among Those Aged 18-64 Based on Life Insurance Claims for 2021 Afte... 23:16 Jan 06 0 comments

Protests over post-vaccination deaths spread across South Korea 23:18 Dec 26 0 comments

Chris Hedges: The execution of Julian Assange 22:19 Dec 19 1 comments

more >>

User Preferences

Feeds

Blog Feeds

Anti-Empire

North Korea Increases Aid to Russia, Mos... Tue Nov 19, 2024 12:29 | Marko Marjanovi?

Trump Assembles a War Cabinet Sat Nov 16, 2024 10:29 | Marko Marjanovi?

Slavgrinder Ramps Up Into Overdrive Tue Nov 12, 2024 10:29 | Marko Marjanovi?

?Existential? Culling to Continue on Com... Mon Nov 11, 2024 10:28 | Marko Marjanovi?

US to Deploy Military Contractors to Ukr... Sun Nov 10, 2024 02:37 | Field Empty

Human Rights in Ireland

Indymedia Ireland is a volunteer-run non-commercial open publishing website for local and international news, opinion & analysis, press releases and events. Its main objective is to enable the public to participate in reporting and analysis of the news and other important events and aspects of our daily lives and thereby give a voice to people.

Trump hosts former head of Syrian Al-Qaeda Al-Jolani to the White House Tue Nov 11, 2025 22:01 | imc

Rip The Chicken Tree - 1800s - 2025 Tue Nov 04, 2025 03:40 | Mark

Study of 1.7 Million Children: Heart Damage Only Found in Covid-Vaxxed Kids Sat Nov 01, 2025 00:44 | imc

The Golden Haro Fri Oct 31, 2025 12:39 | Paul Ryan

Top Scientists Confirm Covid Shots Cause Heart Attacks in Children Sun Oct 05, 2025 21:31 | imc

Human Rights in Ireland >>

Lockdown Skeptics

Reeves Ditches Income Tax Rise ? and Streeting Celebrates Fri Nov 14, 2025 12:28 | Will Jones
Rachel Reeves has?dramatically ditched?Budget?plans to hike income tax, leading Wes Streeting to?effectively claim victory as he publicly declared that he had not supported the rise.
The post Reeves Ditches Income Tax Rise ? and Streeting Celebrates appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

Ben & Jerry?s Needs to Butt Out of UK Democracy Fri Nov 14, 2025 10:25 | Charlotte Gill
Ultra-woke ice cream maker Ben & Jerry's celebrated this week as Parliament responded to its latest campaign ? which was far from its first. It's time for Ben & Jerry's to butt out of UK democracy, says Charlotte Gill.
The post Ben & Jerry’s Needs to Butt Out of UK Democracy appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

The Sceptic: Kathryn Porter on the Lies of the Green Zealots Fri Nov 14, 2025 07:00 | Richard Eldred
In the Sceptic this week, Kathryn Porter on just how much Net Zero is costing us, why Ed Miliband's claims about renewables are so laughable and how the Green Crusade is putting us at risk of blackouts this winter.
The post The Sceptic: Kathryn Porter on the Lies of the Green Zealots appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

News Round-Up Fri Nov 14, 2025 01:44 | Will Jones
A summary of the most interesting stories in the past 24 hours that challenge the prevailing orthodoxy about the ?climate emergency?, public health ?crises? and the supposed moral defects of Western civilisation.
The post News Round-Up appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

Heat Pump Grants to Be Cut in Budget Thu Nov 13, 2025 19:00 | Will Jones
Funding for heat pump grants is set to be cut by billions of pounds at the Budget in a fresh blow to Ed Miliband's green agenda as the Government tries to lower bills amid sky-high energy costs.
The post Heat Pump Grants to Be Cut in Budget appeared first on The Daily Sceptic.

Lockdown Skeptics >>

Voltaire Network

Voltaire, international edition

Will intergovernmental institutions withstand the end of the "American Empire"?,... Sat Apr 05, 2025 07:15 | en

Voltaire, International Newsletter N?127 Sat Apr 05, 2025 06:38 | en

Disintegration of Western democracy begins in France Sat Apr 05, 2025 06:00 | en

Voltaire, International Newsletter N?126 Fri Mar 28, 2025 11:39 | en

The International Conference on Combating Anti-Semitism by Amichai Chikli and Na... Fri Mar 28, 2025 11:31 | en

Voltaire Network >>

The Irish Patriot Act

national | rights, freedoms and repression | opinion/analysis

Saturday May 12, 2007 00:55

by paul o toole

Report this post to the editors

New Law's of the land

Last week in Dail Eireann a raft of new legislation came through. Michael McDoughall drafted amendments to the criminal justice bill. All this happened under cover of election fever two weeks before the government is about to dissolve. The vote was 67 for and 7 against. Where were FG and Labour?, they abstained. Where was the debate-there wasn't any.

The Irish times yesterday on the front page mentioned ...'changes to the right to remain silent' ..It passed through the Seanad un-opposed.

If you were looking for opposition in government there is none on the critical issues.
If society has progressed since the stone age it is in its laws, that this is most evident. Yes we fly planes and carry out heart transplants and flush our excrement away from the place we live, but the greatest achievement that civilisation (I use the term very loosley-believe me)has achieved is its laws.

The right to defend yourself in a court of law-having been accused, the right to face your accusor, the right to bring evidence in your defense, the right to remain silent so not to incriminate yourself, the assumption of innocence until priven guilty. And if all these mechanisms have failed you in your estimation, you have the right to appeal. Before these rights came into being, a king, queen or lord could have your head chopped off or locked up.

This new legislation, in circumstances yet to be defined (you) has literally removed the right to silence. With it goes the presumption of innocence until proven otherwise. What is even more disturbing is the silence from across the chamber floor on the matter.

This is like the patriot act in Ireland, the removal of vast swathes of civil liberties in one fell swoop....and where are the dissenters....silent.

The legislation is actually following what is already going on on the ground anyway. Are we tiptoeing twards a police state?? You couldn't slip a rizla between policy differences in the chamber. The opposition actually supported the measure by abstaining.

Add Your Comments >>

printable version

with comments

atom feed of comments

rss feed of comments

RSS and atom feeds allow you to keep track of new comments on particular stories. You can input the URL's from these links into a rss reader and you will be informed whenever somebody posts a new comment.

Digg this

Furl

Reddit

Gab

Twitter

save preference

Comments (1 of 1)

mental...... welcome to the new world order

by karen fallon

publication date

Tue May 15, 2007 20:36

Report this post to the editors

paul that is scary!!!

could you put in a link to the legislation?
this shit is EVIL and our freedom is now gone.

Add Your Comments >>

© 2001-2025 Independent Media Centre Ireland. Unless otherwise stated by the author, all content is free for non-commercial reuse, reprint, and rebroadcast, on the net and elsewhere. Opinions are those of the contributors and are not necessarily endorsed by Independent Media Centre Ireland. Disclaimer | Privacy