Barrett received a law degree from Trinity College Dublin. He won a full scholarship to the University of Salford from where he later graduated with a PhD in law. He subsequently trained as a solicitor with McCann FitzGerald, qualifying in 2001. He is an accredited arbitrator. He left McCann FitzGerald in 2003 and held legal roles in Bailhache Labesse, Bank of Ireland and Rabobank. He became Head of Legal at Danske Bank Ireland in 2007. Following the nationalisation of Anglo Irish Bank in 2010, he was appointed company secretary, a role he continued in its successor Irish Bank Resolution Corporation until 2012. He was Head of Legal at SEB International Assurance until his appointment as a judge. Barrett has written several legal texts on financial law, a series of case-law indices published by Blackstones and a book on the judicial functions of the House of Lords, published by Palgrave MacMillan and based on research which included interviews with members of the House.
Judicial career
Barrett was appointed to the High Court in January 2014. He was one of the youngest judges ever appointed in Ireland. In a 2016 case involving the relatives of the Easter Rising, he declared that Moore Street was a National Monument in 2016 in a 399-page judgment. Though welcomed by campaigners and some politicians, the decision was overturned by the Court of Appeal in 2018. Barrett's prior position with IBRC caused him to recuse himself from a debt action in 2017, leading to a rehearing of the case.
In a 2019 judgment, Barrett set aside a decision of the Minister for Justice and Equality which refused an application for family reunification, on that basis that a section of the International Protection Act 2015 was unconstitutional. Section 56 did not recognise marriages of refugees for family reunification purposes which took place after arriving in Ireland. Although the case was concerned with a heterosexual marriage, it also impacted positively on LGBT+ couples who may not have been in a position to marry in countries of initial origin where same-sex marriage is not legal. Barrett has been critical of high fees generated by barristers and solicitors through their work in the Irish courts.
''Jones v Minister for Justice and Equality''
Barrett's judgment in Jones v Minister for Justice and Equality was the centre of political and media focus. His decision delivered on 11 July 2019 refused to grant relief to an Australian citizen that the Minister was wrong in law to refuse his application for naturalisation where he had been outside of Ireland for 100 days prior to his application. He held that the requirement in the Irish Nationality and Citizenship Act 1956 for "one year’s continuous residence" for the period prior to an application must be given its "literal reading". He concluded that there was "no basis" for the Department of Justice and Equality's discretionary policy of permitting six weeks absence from Ireland. The judgment was termed a "shock ruling" by TheJournal.ie. The implied effect of the judgment was that "thousands" of people seeking Irish citizenship would become ineligible if they broke the chain of one year's continuous residence. Researcher Conor O’Brien observed however that the statutory language was intended by the Government of the 15th Dáil. Following the decision, the Minister Charlie Flanagan said the decision was "unsettling" and "caused concern", leading to his department and the Attorney General reviewing the decision and legislation "as an urgent priority". Barrett said in the judgment that it was for the Oireachtas to amend the legislation. The Minister and Jones both appealed the decision to the Court of Appeal. Ms Justice Máire Whelan, with whom Mr Justice Brian McGovern agreed, held that Barrett's interpretation of the law was "overly literal" in her judgment for the majority delivered on 14 November 2019. She set aside the High Court decision on the construction of the legislation requiring unbroken residence in Ireland.
