Reform before recruitment - Do we have enough judges?

WHEN high court judge, Mr Justice Richard Humphreys, opened the Parnell Summer School, in Wicklow, yesterday, he suggested our Constitution should be amended to allow the appointment of more judges, so that cases might be more quickly dealt with.

He pointed out that our courts can call on 163 judges to serve 4.8m people — only 34 judges per million people. This ratio puts Ireland firmly at rock-bottom of the European league table.

Anyone ensnared in litigation will be familiar with the bizarre timescales tolerated in our courts, but, even so, they are unlikely to support Mr Justice Humphreys as emphatically as he might imagine.

That our courts usually begin sitting in mid-morning and rise in mid-afternoon does not strengthen his argument. Neither does the fact that the High Court last sat on July 31 and will not resume deliberations until Michaelmas sittings begin on October 2.

That our judiciary is among the best-paid in Europe hardly helps his case, either.

A recent Council of Europe study of 47 countries found that Ireland, along with the UK and Norway, had the best-paid judges.

Our courts, like virtually every public service, might be understaffed, but appointing more judges seems only a small part of the solution, especially as they enjoy, from many of today’s perspectives, a well-paid job that verges on the part-time

. M’lords may buck at the assessment, but, as they might say themselves, the evidence is incontrovertible.