asked the Minister for Justice if he will introduce proposals for legislation immediately to ensure that all cases coming before the Supreme Court in the future will be heard by an uneven number of judges.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Supreme Court Judges.
Subject to the provisions of the Constitution which require that, for the consideration of certain matters, the Supreme Court shall consist of not less that five judges, the law gives the chief justice or, in his absence, the senior judge a discretion to determine whether, on any particular occasion, the appeal shall be heard by three, four or five judges.
With a complement of five judges one of whom may, at any time, be unavailable because he is sitting on the Court of Criminal Appeal or is absent through illness or otherwise, the choice in practice is frequently between a court of four and a court of three notwithstanding the provision which empowers the chief justice to request a judge of the High Court to sit on the hearing of any appeal in the Supreme Court.
My own view, for what it is worth, is that it is undersirable that the Court of Final Appeal should ever be constituted of an even number of judges if it can possibly be avoided, and that in all circumstances a court of three is to be preferred to a court of four. But I recognise that valid objections may be urged against a court of three and that, in fact, it was because of these objections that the law with respect to the composition of the Supreme Court was changed in 1936.
If there were to be legislation on the lines suggested by the Deputy the position would be, as experience has shown, that more frequent recourse would have to be had to a court of three, which, save for certain special and limited purposes, it was the object of the Act of 1936 to get away from.
As I see it, there is no escape from this dilemma except by increasing the number of judges of the Supreme Court or of the High Court—a step which, in present circumstances, I should be very slow to recommend to the Legislature in the absence of a clear indication that there was a general feeling amongst all Parties that such a step should be taken.