Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)

The purpose of this amendment is to limit the requirement for personal service of documents or service by registered post to the notification required under section 15(2) of the Bill as passed by Dáil Éireann, instead of applying this requirement to all notices and documents to be served on or given to a person under Part 3.

Section 15(2) provides that a recovery order shall not enter into force unless the person in respect of whom their order is made fails to pay the fine by the due date of payment. It further provides that where the person so fails, the order shall have effect from the day immediately following the day on which the Courts Service notifies the receiver concerned in writing that the person has failed to pay the fine by that date.

This is a critical notification as it will activate the recovery order and trigger action by the receiver when he or she is notified that a person on whom a fine has been imposed is in default. For that reason it is important that arrangements for the service of this particular notification are clearly defined in primary legislation. New rules of court may be made by the rules committees of the various courts to make provision regarding the service of other documents pursuant to the new jurisdiction conferred on the courts by Part 3 of the Bill. It is not necessary for the Bill to prescribe the manner of service of, for instance, a direction under section 13(5) as passed by Dáil Éireann, requiring a person to attend court for the purpose of assessment of his or her financial circumstances because there is an inherent power to make rules of court where new jurisdiction is given to the court. The same applies to directions under section 14(1) of the Bill, which provides that where a person has made an application to court, the court may direct that the fine be paid by instalments. The manner of service of this direction can also be determined by court rules.

Personal service of or delivery of these latter directions by registered post would not be required in all instances. These are matters best left to court rules in order to optimise the flexibility to the Courts Service in determining the manner of service and to contain postage and other administrative expenses. I recommend the amendment to the House.