Supreme Court rules against parents in deportation case

The Supreme Court today ruled in favour of the Minister for Justice over the proposed deportation of the parents of five Irish-born children.

The Supreme Court today overturned a High Court ruling that said the rights of five Irish-born children had been breached when their applications to remain in Ireland were turned down under the Irish Born Child Scheme.

Today's decision is expected to have implications in hundreds of cases of non-Irish-nationals who are parents of children born in Ireland.

The parents had made applications under the Irish-born child scheme, which ran between January and March 2005.

The residency scheme was established because the legal status of thousands of non-Irish nationals, who had sought residency on the basis of having an Irish-born child, was in doubt following a Supreme Court ruling in February 2003.

More than 18,000 people applied for permission to remain in the State under the scheme. A total of 17,000 were accepted, while 1,119 were turned down.

The five parents involved in today's decision were initially refused the right to remain and ordered to be deported, but they were granted a judicial review, which resulted in the High Court quashing the deportation orders and allowing them to stay.

The Minister appealed the decision, and today the Supreme Court found he had acted within the terms of the scheme in refusing them permission to remain.

The Supreme Court found that in the cases of the five people they did not meet the criteria set out. These include making the application within a specified time frame, a requirement of continuous residence and not being involved in criminal activity.

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