Denis O'Donovan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I will dispense with welcoming the Minister to the House because she is nearly a permanent guest here now. Perhaps she would like to return here again. By and large, Fianna Fáil supports the Bill, the purpose of which is to appoint two additional judges to the High Court following a significant increase in the caseload of the court. Fianna Fáil is also committed to the reform of the judicial appointments system and has published legislation to provide for such reform.

There is no doubt there is an increase in the workload and the increase in civil litigation has clogged up the High Court. The Minister rightly pointed out that there seems to be a considerable increase in the number of lay litigants. I am not sure whether that is the right road to go down. People are entitled to be heard in any court but in some instances frivolous and vexatious procedures by certain lay litigants can clog up the system. Perhaps there is a way to identify the important issues that require judicial attention rather than those that are not appropriate to any court.

My colleague in the other House, Deputy Niall Collins, published a Bill last year proposing to reform the law in respect of the appointment and promotion of persons to judicial office. At present, 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 the judicial office in question and the Minister may or may not accept the recommendation. Under the Judicial Appointments Bill 2014, a new judicial appointments board would be established and the existing board abolished. Instead of recommending seven persons for appointment to judicial office, the board would recommend for appointment by the Government one candidate whom it would certify as the best candidate for appointment to the judicial office in question. The name of the candidate would then be communicated to the Minister for Justice and Equality. In the event of the Government not accepting the recommendation, it would be required to publish in Iris Oifigiúiland on the Department’s website reasons the recommendation was not being accepted. At that stage it would also have to publish the written recommendation of the judicial appointment board promoting the appointment of the person in question. The new board, as suggested by Deputy Niall Collins under the Bill, 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.

Leaving that aside, as it is a boat floated by the Fianna Fáil Party and Deputy Niall Collins, it is very important to note that in January 2014 a committee of judges called for a radical overhaul of the judicial appointments process, saying a merit-based system that limits the Government’s scope to reward political allies is vital to retain public confidence in the judicial system. The judges were sharply critical of a “demonstrably deficient system” and said wide-ranging changes were needed to attract high-calibre applicants. They said political allegiance should have no bearing on appointments to judicial office. They also made the point that, “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 the 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 the flawed and deficient consultation issued by the then Minister, Deputy Alan Shatter. It is very difficult not to take on board some of what the entire body of the judges of this country from the various courts – Circuit Court, District Court, High Court and so forth - said, but leaving all that aside, as we might never get a utopian system, as someone who has practised law for upwards of 30 years, my view is that by and large most of the judges I encountered at various levels from the Supreme Court all the way down to the District Court were pretty decent, pretty efficient and pretty good so the system in some way works well.One must not ignore, however, the criticism of the entire body of judges who are somewhat disappointed regarding how appointments are made. In this regard, I have no doubt that there is a deficit of judges in the High Court. The new Court of Appeal will be another layer of the Judiciary, which is needed. There is much intrinsic work in civil and appeal cases. The Minister referred to judicial reviews which take much time. Perhaps ours is beginning to become like the American system, where people want to litigate rather than mediate. The Bill's proposals are reasonable and I fully support them. I wish the Bill a speedy passage through the House. Fianna Fáil fully endorses it on its way to the Statute Book.