Jack Chambers (Dublin West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Go raibh maith agat, a Chathaoirligh. I thank the committee for making time available to consider my request for a Supplementary Estimate for the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, DPP. As members are no doubt aware, the key function of the office of the DPP is to provide a prosecution service that is independent, fair and effective to the people of Ireland. While the Taoiseach has certain responsibilities to the Oireachtas for administrative matters in the office of the DPP, the office operates independently of the Department.

The office of the DPP was established by law under the Prosecution of Offences Act 1974. The director is independent in the performance of her duties. The key duties of the director are to enforce the criminal law in the courts on behalf of the people, direct and supervise public prosecutions on indictment in the court, give general direction and advice to An Garda Síochána on summary cases and give specific direction to the Garda in cases where this is requested. The chief prosecution solicitor provides a solicitor service within the office of the Director of Public Prosecutions on behalf of the director in cases dealt with in Dublin. The State solicitor service acts on behalf of the director in Circuit Courts and occasionally in the District Courts outside Dublin. It supports private barristers working for the DPP to present the prosecution case in the Circuit Court in their respective county. There is generally one State solicitor per county but in certain counties, State solicitor areas have been split to take account of factors such as population. For example, County Cork is divided into four areas, namely, Cork City, Cork north east, Cork south east and Cork west.

The net Estimate for Vote 5 - Director of Public Prosecutions for 2022 is €47.832 million. This provides for the salaries and expenses of the director and her staff, the cost of the local State solicitor service, fees to counsel engaged by the director to prosecute cases in the various courts, and legal costs awarded against the State arising out of judicial review and other legal proceedings. A Supplementary Estimate of €3,445 million is being sought for 2022, which represents a 7.2% increase in the net allocation. The need for the Supplementary Estimate arises from greater than budgeted expenditure on A3 - Fees to Counsel and input A5 - Local State Solicitor Service. Savings elsewhere on the Vote are insufficient to offset the need for a Supplementary Estimate.

There are a range of factors which give rise to the need for this Supplementary Estimate. I will address these in the order in which they are listed in the Vote. Input A3 is Fees to Counsel. Expenditure on counsel fees is, to a large extent, dependent on the level of activity in the courts at any time, and so is always difficult for the DPP's office to forecast. Three main factors give rise to the projected overspend of €3.725 million on this subhead. First, there is a general increase in activity across all the courts arising from an increased number of prosecutions and as the courts seek to clear the backlog of cases that arose during the pandemic. Second, there has been a significant increase in activity in the Central Criminal Court, due to the fact the number of judges assigned to the court has increased from five to nine. The Central Criminal Court is the court that deals with the prosecution of murder and rape. Third, there are a small number of complex, high-profile cases before the courts, including cases in the current law term, that are incurring significant expenditure. These factors have resulted in a significant increase in court activity which accounts for the overspend on this subhead. As the factors giving rise to the overspend in 2022 are likely to continue into 2023 I inform the committee that to ensure that this underlying level of activity on Fees to Counsel does not give rise to a Supplementary Estimate again in 2023, an additional allocation of €2.5 million has been added to this subhead for 2023. While the volume of fees being paid by the office has increased, the rates the office pays barristers have remained constant. The fee rates are still 26% below those that were paid in 2008.

A5 is the Local State Solicitor Service. There is an anticipated overspend of €220,000 on this input. This input covers the cost of contracts with 32 solicitors in private practice who carry out legal business on behalf of the director outside Dublin. The overrun can be attributed to the following factors: a one-off review of the workload for one of the State solicitors resulted in an increase of €132,000, half of which was arrears from 2021; the payment of an increase arising under the State solicitor's contract came to €75,000; and an amount of €62,000 that was paid to the State solicitors to cover work that fell outside the terms of their contracts. An additional allocation of €250,000 has been added to this subhead for 2023 to address ongoing pressures on it.

The additional expenditure I have advised the committee of amounts to a total of €3.945 million. However, the office anticipates savings of €500,000 on the Administration Pay subhead and this has reduced the amount required by way of Supplementary Estimate to €3.445 million. I recommend this Supplementary Estimate of €3.445 million to the committee.