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Hello all,

Those of you in jurisdictions with constitutions might be interested in a report from today's Irish Times, under the headline "Businessman must repay £43,000 welfare", that the Supreme Court held yesterday that a man who received disability benefit while allegedly owning three businesses must repay the Ir£43,000 he had received from the former Department of Social Welfare. The High Court had held that the relevant statutory provision under which the Department can recover such benefits was not retrospective and thus did not cover the period of the relevant periods, but the Supreme Court reversed. Fennelly J held that the relevant Act was capable of retrospective effect, and that he could not identify any constitutional right to retain the benefit of money wrongly paid, so that a retrospective reading of the legislation would not infringe any constitutional right.

For more detail see: http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/ireland/2001/0117/courts1.htm

Best regards

Eoin

EOIN O'DELL BCL(NUI) BCL(Oxon)
Editor, Dublin University Law Journal.
Barrister, Lecturer in Law, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland.
(353/0 1) 608 1178 (w) 677 0449 (fx); (353/0 86) 286 0739 (m)
(All opinions are personal. No legal responsibility whatsoever is accepted.)