The most important legal sites and legal resources online, relating to Ireland, maintained by Delia Venables.
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Legal Sites and Legal Resources in Ireland
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Last updated on November 20th.
Under the Irish section, there is:
Some of the most recent Irish materials and also a major collection of leading Irish cases, are not on bailii
for some technical reasons but are now on a separate site called Irish Legal Information Initiative (IRLII) at
www.irlii.org awaiting placement on bailii.
IRLII is co-ordinated and funded by University College Cork Law Faculty, who also co-ordinate the Irish
materials on the BAILII site.
There is also a database of Leading Irish Cases organised by subject area,
and the first complete index of decisions of the Irish High Court and Supreme Court, spanning the
period 1997-2001, including citations of cases reported in the Irish Reports and Irish Law Reports Monthly,
as well as links to the text of the decisions on BAILII (if available).
Legalperiodicals.org is a new site set up by the Law Faculty of
University College Cork, containing an index of Irish Legal Periodicals from 1997 to the present.
The intention is to complement UCC's contribution to BAILII and IRLII since these sites do not feature journals heavily.
Links are provided to the articles online where the copyright holder has allowed access and there is an index
of keywords relating to the articles.
The Irish Law Society
offers a very useful and practice-based set of resources. Various sections describe the work
of the Law Society, its members' services, trainee services, how to become a solicitor and details
of their diplomas and CPD courses. There is a directory of solicitors firms which can be searched by
name or location. You can view details of relevant legal Events, News on current bills and Parliamentary
developments, and issues of the Gazette in pdf form. The Library service provides lists of Acts of Parliament
passed since 1998 with brief descriptions of the acts and the commencement dates.
The links section is very comprehensive and is one of the best sources available for Irish Legal resources.
The Houses of the Oireachtas site
provides Parliamentary debates from the Dail and Seanad and also (under
Legislative Information) listings of Bills presented in both
Houses over the same period. The stage reached for each bill can be viewed directly
on the site but the full text is only available in pdf format. The Acts from the same period
are also available in pdf format on this site but for an online version,
The Irish Attorney General's site (see below) is more useful.
The Houses of the Oireachtas site also contains
useful links including Political Parties' and Members' Web Sites.
The complete archives of Ireland Parliamentary Debates are available
here.
The database contains the full text of the Official Report of the Parliamentary Debates of the
Houses of the Oireachtas Dil ireann and Seanad ireann as published by the Stationery
Office in bound volumes. It includes the Dail Debates from 21 January 1919 (First Dil) to 15 May 1997
(Twenty-Seventh Dil) and the Seanad Debates from 11 December 1922 (First Seanad) to 10 July 1997
(Twentieth Seanad).
Senator Feargal Quinn provides a site dedicated to making the
Irish Parliamentary Process easy to understand for the ordinary citizen. The main focus on this site is the
scrutiny of new laws - about 40 each year - as they go through the legislative process. He uses (and links to)
the material on the official Parliamentary site but provides explanations along the way. The site
would be perfect for students of law or anyone who is prepared to admit that they do not know it all!
The Irish Attorney General's Office provides the Acts of the Oireachtas (Acts of Parliament)
from 1922 to 2005. The Acts are structured by year, and can then be accessed alphabetically or numerically or by
searching processes. Statutory Instruments are also available from 1922 to 2005. There is also a chronological table
of statutes 1922 to 2005.
The Irish Government site provides
information about the Irish state, links to all Government Departments and
also to Local Authorities and Health Boards.
There is a What's new section, lots of press releases and a set of web links.
There are also links to
BASIS (Business Access to State Information and Services)
and Citizens Information.
Both of these attempt to lay out government information in a user
friendly manner.
The Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform
offers its publications, mainly in Adobe format.
There is a useful What's New section covering the last month's additions to the site.
The Irish Courts Service offers a judgment database
with written judgments of the Supreme Court from the year 2001
and written judgments of the Court of Criminal Appeal from the year 2004 only. It says on the site that
judgments of other courts will be available in due course. There is also a daily list of all the cases for hearing
in the Supreme Court, the Court of Criminal Appeal the Central Criminal Court the High Court and the Dublin Circuit Court.
There is extensive information on the legal system in Ireland and on the Court system and
a FAQ page with information on legal topics (A-Z) directly related to the court service.
Court forms are now beginning to go online in Word format and in pdf format; these can be downloaded and
filled in but then have to
be printed out and returned to the relevant court in the traditional way. (There have been some experiments
with forms being submitted online but that does not seem to be happening at the moment).
Citizens Information is an Irish eGovernment website provided
by the Citizens Information Board. The site provides public service information for Ireland.
It covers Birth, Family and Relationships, Education and Training, Employment, Environment,
European government, Elections and referenda, Health, Housing, Social Welfare and
a major section on Justice (see below).
Justice Section of the Citizens Information site,
covers Law and rights, Civil law, Criminal law, Law enforcement, Courts system, Courtroom,
Arrests, Legal aid and advice, Witnesses, Evidence, Prison system, Probation and welfare services,
Victims of crime, Crime and crime prevention, Children and young offenders.
Ombudsman Ireland
investigates complaints about administrative action, delay or inaction of Government Departments and
Offices, Local Authorities, Health Boards and the postal service.
British and Irish Ombudsmen Organisation
provides information on all ombudsmen.
Irish Law Links is hosted by University College Cork Law Faculty, and maintained by
Darius Whelan. There are sections on the Irish Constitution (in various versions),
the Irish and Northern Irish Legal Systems and Courts,
Irish and Northern Irish Government Information, Legal Academics and Practitioners,
the Peace Process, European Law from an Irish perspective, Miscellaneous
Irish links and General Irish Information. There is also a discussion
group called IrishLaw for all topics relating to the law of Ireland
and/or Northern Ireland. This at present has around 400 members.
Darius is also one of the people responsible for
Irish Legal Information Initiative - IRLII
and its relationship as an information source to
BAILII.
Irish Law blog
(Updates on Irish and Northern Irish Law) is maintained by Darius Whelan, of University College Cork
Law Faculty, as above.
Findlaw's Irish page
can be used to search for Irish legal materials.
LawLink Limited was established
to research and develop a nationwide
communications service for the legal profession and additionally set up
electronic access to Government and high profile databases and information
stores.
Hibernia College is an international provider of online
programmes at undergraduate and graduate level. It is accredited by the Irish Government's qualifications awarding
body for third-level educational and training institutions outside the university sector, the Higher Education
and Training Awards Council. Hibernia College provides all of its courses
online, using state of the art technology for both synchronous and asynchronous course delivery.
In particular, Hibernia College offers a preparatory course for The Law Society of Ireland's Final Examination Part One
(Entrance Examination). The course is studied exclusively over the internet, so is particularly suitable for
people who want to practice in Ireland but are currently living elsewhere. The subjects covered are
Constitutional, Contract, Criminal, Tort, Company, Equity and Trusts, EU, and Property.
Dublin Solicitors Bar Association
(DSBA) was set up in 1938 by a group of solicitors
who identified the need for an Association of practising solicitors to reflect
the views of those practising throughout Dublin and to represent their interests.
At that time the number of solicitors throughout Dublin numbered no more than 355
and throughout the country a mere 789 as compared with the three thousand solicitors
in Dublin alone today and nearly seven thousand solicitors throughout the country.
It is purely and simply a representational body (not the Law Society) -
more a "trade union" for solicitors to lobby for the benefit of members
and the betterment of the Society.
Legal Island
provides links to legal sites in Ireland and also in Northern Ireland particularly related to employment.
Irish Redress Board was set up
under the Residential Institutions Redress Act, 2002 to make fair and reasonable
awards to persons who, as children, were abused while resident in industrial schools,
reformatories and other institutions subject to state regulation or inspection.
The claims are open to anyone who was abused in an Irish Institution at any time
although time runs out in December 2005.
The Web site provides a general outline of the way in which the Board deals with
applications for redress.
Copyright Association of Ireland was formed by a group of people
who have an interest in copyright law (whether as legal practitioners, creators of copyright works or as academics).
It aims to promote informed debate on copyright, awareness of copyright among users of copyright works,
creators of copyright works and the public generally, to examine legislative measures having effect on copyright
and to promote informed debate and awareness of copyright by holding conferences and seminars.
Partnership Law
is run by Michael Twomey, a consultant and lecturer in partnership law in Ireland.
He is the author of the definitive guide to Irish
partnership law ("Partnership Law" published by Butterworths). The site
provides regular updates on developments in the law of partnership in
Ireland as well as relevant developments from other common law
jurisdictions such as UK, Scotland, Australia, Canada and New Zealand
(all these countries use basically the same Partnership Act 1890.)
There is also a set of links to partnership law bodies worldwide.
Current Legal News and Legal Briefings relating to Ireland:
British & Irish Legal Education
Technology Association (BILETA) was formed in 1986 with the primary
objective of promoting technology in legal education throughout
the United Kingdom and Ireland.
British and Irish Association of
Law Librarians (BIALL) was formed in 1969 to represent effectively the
interests of all those involved in law librarianship.
Irish Times - well
set up and designed with stories well presented as well as archive materials.
Kieron Wood
barrister, provides information on "Nullity or Divorce?", "Want
an Irish Divorce?", the Divorce Act (simplified), Divorce Forms, Family Law
Statutes, How to make an Irish Will, Irish Legal Terminology, a set of links
to Irish and other legal resources online and a list of Irish Barristers
with phone numbers and email addresses. He also has a section on Irish
Citizenship which explains how to go about acquiring Irish citizenship and a
section on Irish Work Permits which sets out the required information for
non-EU applicants for Irish work permits.
Graphite HRM is a company
specialising in Human Resource Management and which provides
an online reference manual on the translation of
employment law into practice. This includes "Personnel Policies and Procedures: The Law in
Perspective" which is updated regularly in line with legal changes.
The manaul is available on subscription but there are sample sections
which can be viewed free of charge on the site.
ComReg is the statutory body responsible for the regulation
of the electronic communications sector (telecommunications, radiocommunications and broadcasting transmission)
and the postal sector and was established on 1 December 2002.
Enhanced British Parliamentary Papers on Ireland
(EPPI) involves the electronic cataloguing and full-text digitisation of some 13,700 British Parliamentary papers
(containing around 365,000 pages) from the University of Southampton's Ford Collection of
Official Publications.
The parliamentary Blue Books contain masses of information on Ireland and its relations with Britain
in this period: from massive social inquiries and census enumerations, through reports on economic,
educational and scientific subjects, cultural and linguistic institutions and political and military
developments, to transcripts of semi-literate emigrant letters.
Phase 1 provides a comprehensive searchable database of
Parliamentary Papers relating to Ireland 1801-1922, with bibliographic information,
Library of Congress subject descriptors and, for a significant selection of items, abstracts of contents.
Phase 2, the full text digitisation of the records identified in Phase 1, was completed in 2005.
Gillian Kelly, a barrister,
offers a series of legal analysis papers devoted to the judicial
recognition of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder as a valid head of claim
in damages for personal injuries, at common law. The Hillsborough
decisions are analysed (Alcock v.Chief Constable of Sth.Yorkshire and
White v.Chief Constable of Sth.Yorkshire) and compared with the latest
Irish decisions in this area (Kelly v.Hennessy and McHugh v.Minister for
Defence). The page is updated according to seminal judicial decisions in
the common law jurisdictions.
Finfacts ("the Irish Finance Portal")
is an extensive source of financial and business information (and it includes UK,
Europe-wide and USA financial information as well).
Roger Clapham
provides a collection, analysis and commentary on Irish Financial Resources.
This is the place to find organisations, topics and news relating
to business, banking, finance, government, insurance, tax and related topics.
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