Patrick Costello (Dublin South Central, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

In relation the Courts Service, I note there is a carryover for capital expenditure. We have spent a lot of time in this committee talking about courthouses and the need to invest in them.

I have been asking that since I got in here in 2020. It is a giant hole in the ground that should be a family court. I have spent a lot of time talking about family courts and their importance. To put it simply, when is the courthouse at Hammond Lane going to be built? When will building even start?

There is reference to increased court sittings in the Minister of State's opening statement. I would hope that is driven by the increased number of judges the Government has appointed. I welcome the increase in the number of judges. We absolutely need more. As we are appointing more judges, are we appointing a sufficient number of registrars? Obviously, a judge cannot sit without a registrar and orders cannot be perfected. The work of the court simply cannot be done without a registrar. Much of this work could be streamlined and registrars' lives made much easier if there was a roll-out of certain IT services, such as digital filing, through the central office. As with the in-cell technology, the computers for education, if we look at other jurisdictions, we see that we do not need to reinvent the wheel. Other countries, including other common law countries, are doing this very well. All filings can be done remotely by digital means, streamlining the system. There are several advantages to this. It makes life easier for the barristers, the solicitors and the registrars but it also makes life easier for the rest of us because court papers, which should be public because justice should be seen to be administered in public, can be accessed much more easily and quickly by everybody. That is a really important element to this.

What are we doing to modernise? Senator McDowell has been on his feet in the Seanad venting his frustrations in respect of the central office with regard to its opening hours and the fact that the restrictive measures it brought in during the Covid pandemic are still in place, which hampers the work of many barristers in the courts. Again, a technology roll-out could be a significant help. Given that we are talking about the Estimates, is there sufficient funding in the Estimates or in the budget for this year or next year to ensure a proper roll-out of technology for the central office?