Niall Collins (Limerick, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Fianna Fáil will be supporting the Bill to appoint two additional judges to the High Court following a significant increase in the court's caseload. Fianna Fáil is also committed to reform of the judicial appointments system and has published legislation to provide for such reforms.

The purpose of the Courts Bill is to address the problems associated with the significant increase in the number of cases coming before the High Court, including judicial review, medical negligence, asylum and company law-related applications. Problems have also arisen from the increased duration of trials in the Central Criminal Court owing to the increased complexity of evidence coming before it. These factors are leading to longer waiting times for cases to be heard and an increase in the number of cases not proceeding on days listed for hearing, as well as a significant number of reserved judgments. In order to address these problems, the Minister for Justice and Equality believes additional judicial resources are required in the High Court and the Bill provides for this. The Courts and Court Officers Act 1995, as amended by the Courts and Court Officers (Amendment) Act 2007, provides, in section 9, that the number of ordinary judges of the High Court shall be not more than 35. The Bill will increase the maximum number of judges to 37.

In October last year the President of the High Court said he was struggling to find judges for new cases because the Government had not yet moved to fill seven vacancies in the court. Seven senior High Court judges were due to be promoted to the new Court of Appeal at the end of October 2014, but although they remained judges of the High Court, they were not assigned to cases that could run from November 2014. The Judicial Appointments Advisory Board sent a list of names to the Department of Justice and Equality in mid-September 2014, but the Cabinet did not sign off on the nominations. This means, in effect, that the High Court has been short seven judges since. Twice in the High Court last year Mr. Justice Nicholas Kearns said he was hard-pressed in trying to manage his list and have cases heard because he was still awaiting the appointment of seven new judges.

There is also an issue with the shortage of court registrars. Last April the President of the High Court said serious delays in dealing with court cases would result from a continuing shortage of registrars. The duties of registrars include assisting the judge, calling cases, swearing in witnesses, drafting orders and generally ensuring the smooth running of the court.

Mr Justice Kearns warned that unless the matter was resolved and additional staff were provided, the problem would result in serious delays and logjams in disposing of court lists. He said this was not a problem of the courts' or the Courts Service's making but that approval for extra staff must come from the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform. The Courts Service had applied for approval to appoint three registrars as the bare minimum to meet its immediate obligations. Two of these would be replacements for registrars who retired years ago. It is our understanding a shortage of registrars continues.

Last year I published the Judicial Appointments Bill 2014, which proposes to reform the law in the appointment and promotion of persons to judicial office. The law simply requires the Judicial Appointments Advisory Board to recommend to the Minister for Justice and Equality at least seven persons for appointment to judicial office. The Minister may or may not accept the recommendations made. Under the Judicial Appointments Bill 2014, a new board, the judicial appointments board, would be established and the old Judicial Appointments Advisory Board abolished. Instead of recommending seven persons for appointment to judicial office, the judicial appointments board would recommend for appointment by the Government one candidate whom it would certify as the best candidate for appointment to judicial office. The name of this candidate would then be communicated to the Minister for Justice and Equality. If the Government did not accept this recommendation, it would be required to publish in Iris Oifigiúil and on the Department's website the reasons the recommendation was not being accepted. At that stage, it would also have to publish the written recommendation of the judicial appointments board promoting the appointment of the person concerned.

Under the Bill the judicial appointments board would be made up of the Chief Justice, the President of the High Court, the President of the Circuit Court, the President of the District Court, the Attorney General, a nominee of the Bar Council of Ireland, a nominee of the Law Society of Ireland, a person appointed by the Minister and a person appointed by the National Consumer Agency.

Early last year a judges' committee called for a radical overhaul of the appointments process, stating a merit-based system that would limit the Government's scope to reward political allies was vital to retain public confidence in the justice system.

The judges were sharply critical of what they described as a "demonstrably deficient" system and say wide-ranging changes are needed to attract high calibre applicants. They say political allegiance should have no bearing on appointments to judicial office. They said: "It is increasingly clear that the relative success of the administration of justice in Ireland has been achieved in spite of, rather than because of the appointment system". The judges also said that changes to public and private pension provisions for entrants to the Judiciary "may have little fiscal benefit to the State, yet create a wholly disproportionate disincentive to applicants for judicial posts and deter high quality applicants from seeking appointment."

The views of the State's 154 judges are contained in a joint submission to the Department of Justice and Equality, which was carrying out a public consultation on ways to reform the appointments process. The judges are critical of that "flawed and deficient" consultation, initiated by the then Minister for Justice and Equality, Deputy Shatter. The judges said it was regrettable there was no prior consultation with the Judiciary on the methodology and structure of the process and pointed out that no proposals had been put forward by Government for discussion purposes. They also said:

Most fundamentally of all, however, the process itself is being initiated by a member of the Executive, and will apparently be decided upon by the Executive without further discussion. This is not consistent with the principles of the European Network of Councils for the Judiciary, Council of Europe, or international best practice.

The judges said a high level body should be appointed to carry out research, receive submissions and develop detailed proposals in a "structured, principled and transparent way to make a radical improvement in the judicial appointments process in Ireland."

Making preliminary recommendations for reform, the submission states that as a matter of principle, political allegiance should have no bearing on appointment to judicial office. The judges said: "The merit principle should be established in legislation." The judges said a properly resourced judicial education system should be established without delay with a mandate to provide education to members of the Judiciary on all matters bearing on the administration of justice.

A judicial council was described as a "much-needed reform" and the judges said it should be created with responsibility for representation of the Judiciary, an independent disciplinary process, judicial education and judicial involvement in the appointment process. The submission calls for far-reaching changes to the Judicial Appointments Advisory Board, which receives applications and sends to the Government a list of all candidates who meet minimum criteria. Under the current system, the board cannot rank applicants and the Government is not required to select from its list.

I introduced a Bill on behalf of the Fianna Fáil Party, the Judicial Sentencing Commission Bill 2013. The legislation looked to establish a judicial sentencing commission, similar to the model currently in operation in England and Wales. It would reform the area of criminal sentencing, improve consistency and work to enhance public confidence. Under the proposal, the commission would be made up of eight judicial members appointed by the Chief Justice, six non-judicial members appointed by the Minister with the agreement of the Chief Justice and two judicial members would serve as chair and deputy chair. This new commission would be tasked with preparing sentencing guidelines for criminal offences, taking into account the following: the sentences imposed by courts for offences, the need to promote consistency in sentencing, the impact of sentencing decisions on victims of criminal offences, the need to promote public confidence in the criminal justice system and the cost of different sentences and their relevant effectiveness in preventing re-offending. We introduced the Bill a number of years ago and it has an impact on how the Judiciary works. We support the Bill before the House for the creation of two extra judicial posts to the High Court.

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