Ms Justice Mary Ellen Ring:

I think we would say it was uneven. We have experience of sending complaints to certain districts and they are dealt with very efficiently. In other districts they are not dealt with as efficiently. There may be valid reasons for this, including that we must send cases to superintendents. If we send a minor complaint, albeit major to the complainant, to a superintendent in a busy area, as opposed to a case involving a crisis in policing or a serious crime in the area, it will be down the list of priorities, perhaps not surprisingly. The process can, therefore, be uneven for good reasons. It can be difficult if someone is sick or unavailable for interview and one cannot force people to come in. Therefore, there may be real but sometimes questionable delays in that regard. As noted by Deputy Clare Daly, if somebody retires during the handling of a complaint and is no longer amenable to discipline, the investigation will come to an abrupt end. We would like to see more consistency and certainty in how an investigation progresses. Our role is simply to send reminders. However, as I said, if these reminders have no teeth, they are just added to the pile of correspondence on a superintendent's desk.