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Social Welfare Law

Selected Works

Constitutional Law

2012

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Full-Text Articles in Law

Access To Quasi-Judicial Decisions – Jama V Minister For Social Protection, Mel Cousins Dec 2011

Access To Quasi-Judicial Decisions – Jama V Minister For Social Protection, Mel Cousins

Mel Cousins

This case involves the important issue of access to the decisions of social welfare appeals officers. The Irish High Court concluded that there was no duty on the Department to maintain a database or open library of decisions to which the public may have access and, therefore, no question of a right of access thereto arose. However, it is submitted that the legal analysis of the general issue is doubtful.

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Equal Protection, Immigrants And Access To Health Care And Welfare Benefits, Mel Cousins Dec 2011

Equal Protection, Immigrants And Access To Health Care And Welfare Benefits, Mel Cousins

Mel Cousins

The introduction of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA) led to considerable litigation on the rights of immigrants to welfare benefits and access to health care. There was considerable divergence between the approaches adopted by the different courts (both federal and State) based, in part, on the different statutory schemes involved but also on different approaches to equal protection. However, none of the cases reached the Supreme Court so the ‘correct’ approach remained unclarified. Perhaps inspired by the fiscal crisis of 2008, several States have again excluded certain legal immigrants from the scope of State …

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