Letter in yesterday’s Irish Examiner.
Legal contradiction
ARTICLE 48 of the EU’s Charter of Fundamental Rights says: “Everyone who has been charged shall be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law.”
Part 7, Section 99 (2) of the Charities Bill 2009, recently signed into law here, makes it a criminal offence to sell a mass card without the permission of a Catholic bishop. The act states:
“In proceedings for an offence under this section it shall be presumed, until the contrary is proved on the balance of probabilities, that the sale of the Mass card to which the alleged offence relates was not done pursuant to an arrangement with a recognised person.
The clear contradiction begs the question: are we living in a liberal democratic republic or a theocracy?
Anthony Sheridan
Cobh
Co Cork