Mr. Seamus McCarthy:

The 2015 appropriation account for Vote 22 - Courts Service recorded gross expenditure of just over €107 million, an increase of 1.6% compared to 2014. I have provided a chart which gives a high level breakdown of the expenditure. As indicated in the chart, expenditure on pay was around €49 million. At year end 2015, a total of 948 full-time equivalent staff were employed in the Courts Service. Members should note this pay figure does not include the salaries or pensions of judges. Those are paid directly from the Central Fund of the Exchequer, and are estimated at around €32 million for 2015.

The Courts Service incurred expenditure of €20 million in 2015 in costs associated with the Criminal Courts of Justice building, which came into use in 2009 under a 25 year public private partnership arrangement. The annual outlay includes elements of both acquisition costs and premises running costs, which over the life of the PPP are projected to be of the order of €600 million.

The service has also been engaged for a number of years in progressing other PPP projects for the construction or refurbishment of courthouses. Costs of €1.9 million in 2015 associated with developing those projects are included in the spending of €4.6 million incurred on courthouse capital works.

Appropriation-in-aid of the Vote expenditure totalled €48 million, of which €44 million was court fees revenue. In addition, court-imposed fines totalling €11 million were received and paid over to the Exchequer and around €6.6 million in fines and excise fees was collected by the Courts Service and paid over to the Revenue Commissioners. At the end of 2015, an unspent amount of €1.14 million was liable for surrender from Vote 22 back to the Exchequer.