Written answers

Wednesday, 30 April 2014

Department of Justice and Equality

Court Poor Box

Photo of Tommy BroughanTommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)
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547. To ask the Minister for Justice and Equality if he will provide a breakdown, based on each court district, of the number of drivers in each month of 2014 to date who have appeared in court charged with offences under the Road Traffic Acts and avoided convictions because they agreed to make a donation to the court poor box. [18678/14]

Photo of Alan ShatterAlan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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The court poor box is a non-statutory system used mostly by the District Courts to impose a financial charge on a defendant to be used for a charitable purpose, usually instead of imposing a criminal conviction. Payments made to the court poor box are accounted for by the court office concerned and the accounting procedures are subject to audit by the Comptroller and Auditor General. Generally, charities are the recipients of poor box contributions but the decision is solely at the discretion of the Judge who is independent in the matter of sentencing, as in other matters concerning the exercise of judicial functions, subject only to the Constitution and the law.

In order to be of assistance to the Deputy, I have had enquiries made and the table below sets out by District the number of drivers who appeared in court charged with offences under the Road Traffic Acts and the outcome of whose cases resulted in payments to the Court Poor Box in January, February and March 2014.

District NumberJanuary FebruaryMarchTotal
District No 144210
District No 219131143
District No 3300 3
District No 492011
District No 527211
District No 60101
District No 70000
District No 80000
District No 9229435
District No 101001
District No 1215131745
District No 13515929
District No 154127
District No 160000
District No 17671932
District No 181318738
District No 19010 1
District No 201982956
District No 21710926
District No 2264111
District No 231001
District No 240000
District No 250000
Dublin Metropolitan District 834154178
Total219154166539

The Deputy will be aware that the Government recently approved the drafting of the Criminal Justice (Community Sanctions) Bill and the publication of the General Scheme of the Bill. The proposed legislation will abolish the Court Poor Box and replace it with a statutory Reparation Fund to provide for a fair, equitable and transparent system of reparation that will apply only to minor offences dealt with by the District Court.

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