Concerns expressed by barristers about the right to silence provision in the Criminal Justice Bill 2007 were rejected by Minister for Justice Michael McDowell.
Mr McDowell said he was not abrogating the right to silence.
"The right is internationally recognised, but nowhere, except, perhaps, Ireland and the United States, is it prohibited to draw inferences from a failure to mention certain matters.
"Internationally understood, the right to silence is that nobody can be compelled on punishment to incriminate him or herself or risk a prosecution due to a failure to answer a question which would be incriminating. That is the meaning of the right to silence."
Mr McDowell said it was "bogus for some people in Ireland, who pretend to be knowledgeable, or stress their status as practitioners, to claim otherwise".
Referring to a letter to him from some 140 barristers, the Minister said: "I am grateful to those barristers who wrote to me, but, as far as I am concerned, they got it wrong with regard to the right to silence and other issues. They got it right in that successive burglaries should not trigger three-quarter sentences, and I intend to deal with that issue."
The Minister made his remarks during the Committee Stage debate on the Bill. He agreed to accept some amendments and consider others before next week's Report Stage debate on the Bill, for which extra time has been allocated following Opposition complaints about the time allowed for yesterday's debate.
Mr McDowell agreed with a Fine Gael and Labour proposal allowing acquittals to be quashed if new evidence of guilt emerged, but claimed it needed more debate.
He rejected a Fine Gael proposal allowing courts to admit evidence even if it had been obtained unconstitutionally. He warned that it could be open to constitutional challenge and might sink the entire Bill.
There were differing views among Opposition justice spokespeople on the provision allowing for the electronic tagging of serious criminal suspects released on bail.
Expressing strong support for electronic tagging, Fine Gael's Jim O'Keeffe insisted that it worked in other countries and was cost-effective.
"If I had the option of being held in custody pending trial or being released on bail with a tag, I would prefer the latter. That would not be a diminution of one's civil liberties."
Labour spokesman Brendan Howlin said that, while he had an open mind on the issue, he remained to be convinced about it. "I am wary of an unproven technology, but if it provides for the release of criminals without having to incarcerate them, while ensuring they are no danger to the public, it may be a useful device."
Opposing the provision, Sinn Féin's Aengus Ó Snodaigh said a British report had found it cost twice as much as supervision by members of the probation service. "The private security companies which administered the electronic tagging schemes did not routinely follow up violations by individual offenders."
Ciaran Cuffe, of the Green Party, suggested a pilot project on electronic tagging before the section was enacted.
