Brian Lenihan Jnr (Dublin West, Fianna Fail)

What Deputy O'Shea advocates already happens; there is already pooling of District Court clerks. The temporary assignment is done by a formal document signed by a senior member of staff in the Courts Service who has due delegation from the board. This is a very inflexible, time-consuming and cumbersome arrangement. The amendment is necessary to allow for an oral direction with a written record to be sufficient to validly transfer a clerk. It is a legal matter. Under the proposed amendment, legally speaking, shorter notice can be provided. There is nothing to stop the pooling of clerks in an assignment as advocated by Deputy O'Shea. One can have two clerks if necessary. The section as currently drafted, "as the Courts Service shall from time to time direct", does not specify how this direction is to be made or recorded. It could be argued that the Courts Service is at large to decide how to direct a clerk and make a record of it and that no change is needed. However the Attorney General's office advised that we insert this to put the matter beyond doubt, that as a matter of administrative practice a simple direction be given provided a record is taken.

On Deputy Flanagan's point about the wider issue of the District Court boundaries, progress has been made and the relevant orders are being made this year and have already begun to come into operation. While I appreciate Deputy Flanagan made this point from a wider national perspective, it will involve the creation of a Laois-Offaly district. As the Deputy will appreciate, while the Government assigns judges to particular districts, there is the matter of consultation with the judges and I am satisfied that we are in a position to implement the county-based scheme.

When the county-based scheme is introduced there will be anomalies. If a district judge is assigned to County Westmeath, that judge has no jurisdiction in the southern part of County Roscommon, adjacent to the town of Athlone. Similarly, Roscrea is adjacent to County Laois, but the judge assigned to Laois-Offaly will deal with that. For better or worse we should abide with the counties. Given that the counties have long been recognised as the basis of the Circuit Court jurisdictions, it is wise to use them for the District Court jurisdictions too.

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