Barry Cowen (Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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113. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality the status of the €1.5 million allocated to courts reform as outlined in budget 2018; the amount that has been spent; the way in which the money has been spent; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [27251/18]

Charles Flanagan (Laois, Fine Gael)
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As the Deputy will be aware, under the provisions of the Courts Service Act 1998, management of the courts is the responsibility of the Courts Service which is independent in exercising its functions.

However, in order to be of assistance to the Deputy, I have had enquiries made and the Courts Service has informed me that additional funding of €1.5 million, which represents a 1.9% increase on 2017 funding, was provided to the Courts Service in 2018. The additional funding provided in 2018 forms part of the overall Courts Service budget and it is not possible to isolate expenditure as directly attributable to the additional €1.5 million allocated.

The Courts Service has advised that given the demands for funding it was necessary to spread the additional allocation across a range of existing programmes and also to support the day to day operation of the courts. Programmes supported by the additional funding include Change Management (supporting the implementation of a range of reform projects), Learning and Development (including technical/legal skills training), Business Support and support for the implementation of Government legislative initiatives including the establishment of the new Assisted Decision Making Regime under the Assisted Decision Making Act 2015 and the establishment of the Legal Costs Adjudicators Office under the Legal Services Regulation Act 2015.

A significant element (€1 million) of the additional funding has been targeted at planned maintenance of the large number of court buildings around the country as well as at a comprehensive survey of all court buildings to be carried out during 2018.