Enoch Burke turns up to school again despite sacking - read OP before posting

no, you didn't. my question was clearly on changes to how contempt works not how those changes come into effect.

Our contempt laws never anticipated irrational behaviour like that exhibited by the Enoch Burke.

There is a strong case to at least clarify the contempt laws by putting them on a statutory footing, as has been done in some of the other common law jurisdictions. And no harm to take the opportunity to modernise them at the same time. Contempt of Court is a direct and deliberate affront to our society and needs to be dealt with. As one senior Canadian judge put it, "To allow Court orders to be disobeyed would be to tread the road towards anarchy. If the orders of the Court can be treated with disrespect, the whole administration of justice is brought into scorn. Daily, thousands of Canadians resort to our Courts for relief against the wrongful acts of others. If the remedies that Courts grant to correct those wrongs can be ignored, then there will be nothing left but for each person to take the law into his own hands. Loss of respect for the Courts will quickly result in the destruction of our society."

… indeed, which may be a big issue for more than just the Burkes!

Galatians 5:22-23 - But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.

For someone who loudly professes her Christianity it’s difficult to find any trace of the Christian traits mentioned above in her behaviour, attitude and verbiage

Vicious ould harridan more like.

Username checks out.

Her name is Karen, you couldn't make it up.

TBH. I am going to give the benefit of the doubt to the half of the family we do not hear about.

Have they escaped and are they just absolutely mortified by the conduct of their parents and younger siblings?

Just saw the latest video from them. It's intiresting that when they corner Peadar Toibin, he seems relativley friendly at first and even agrees that he's voting no to the bill, which is what the Burkes want, but that's not good enough. They harass and harrangue him for not bieng "passionate" enough until he has to sense to just walk away from the loons. There's no good-faith argument from this family, just pre-scripted rants.

Saw that, no attempt to engage with him at all, he actually said something about does your hearing work? They didn’t even want to hear what someone in their ‘side’ of that debate would say as it was never going to go far enough. They seem to be upping the camera in the face bits now and I think it’s only a matter time before they do it to the wrong person and get more than a sound bite.

On his letter he has "Dr. Isaac Burke….. PhD".

You don't use both - either "Isaac Burke PhD" or "Dr. Isaac Burke".

The latter would normally only be used in a professional capacity when connected to his qualification - for example in academia.

You are missing the point. The law was never meant to be punitive, only coercive.

It's not just my opinion.

The Law Reform Commission and literal Supreme Court judges have called for reform for years. Decades in fact.

They have questioned the actually legality of the law when held up against the constitution and human rights legislation.

There was an actual bill introduced in 2017 to change it, but it expired because it tacked a lot of things that may interfered with freedom of the press, etc.

But to simplify, Human Rights 101 in Western Countries. You don't remove the liberty of someone indefinitely without a trial even despite themselves. It's a corner stone of any liberal democracy. Even in Russia they have show trials.

But the aim is clear here, he has done 450-500 odd days of bird, he is full in on this.

The Judiciary are already very uneasy about this, it's why he is given so much leeway.

But when do the rest of us start to get uncomfortable, 5,000 days, 10,000, 15,000?

There will come a point when the mood music changes and he will start getting support from the civil rights side of the legal profession.

His mother has absolutely no problem sacrificing his life to play the victim.

They are getting exactly what they want.

"Dr. Isaac Burke….. PhD"

Pity he didn't get the diploma in computers, like Rodney Trotter…

The invisible third person filming is one of the daughters. I don't think its Ammi, (or at least not usually). I think its either Jemima or Kezia from what I can tell.

I watched the video of when they accosted Simon Harris in Castlebar, one of the Burkes filming was Simeon, but I think the other was Kezia. But it might be Jemima!

It never ceases to be coercive though

That doesn't really matter. When it crosses the threshold of being punitive that is when the opaqueness of the law becomes tricky.

Even it was changed to a punitive punishment, say Burke got 30 days for turning up at the school, he would simply turn up again when released and be sent back for another 30 days, and so on.

It is already by any barometer punitive.

What you want to do is make it a criminal offence and give it a statutory footing with a clear frame work.

If he chooses to break the law then he is treated like every other criminal, he gets a trial and if found guilty is punished.

The main positive of that is it relieves the school of having to do part of the justices systems job for them which comes at great stress and cost.