I was saying last night that I really doubt the sincerity of the Labour Party and their attitude to this Bill. I must say that I was very surprised to hear a young man like Deputy Corish, in the course of the by-election in Wicklow, complain that the Government proposed to increase the salaries of judges and district justices.
Courts of Justice Bill, 1953—Second Stage (Resumed).
Question again proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."
It is only what a Deputy says here that is relevant for discussion.
I really doubted the sincerity of Deputy Everett last night when he adopted the same line. However, the object of the Labour Party is to try to get as many concessions as possible for the labouring classes.
Are the High Court judges in that category now?
In fact, that is their duty, to try to pursue a course designed to better the lot of the working classes. They would be very poor men if they did not pursue their aim to the utmost of their ability. I do suggest, however, that it is quite wrong of them to try to convince those people who voted for them, and for whom they work, that other sections of the community have not a similar right to have their salaries increased for the work they do on behalf of the community.
In 1924, a district justice was considered worth a salary of £1,000 per annum. Do the members of the Labour Party assert now, what was not asserted then, that the district justices were not entitled to that amount? Apparently, they do not. Why, then, do they suggest that £1,700 is too much in 1953, in view of the fact that the value of money has certainly been more than halved in the intervening years? Let us, for the sake of argument, take the position of the manual worker. In 1924, he was working for something not more than £1 a week. Nowadays, he gets £5 or £6. I am not suggesting for a moment that he is getting one penny more than he is entitled to. Indeed, I am not suggesting that he is getting enough, but at any rate he is getting, roughly, six times what he was getting in 1924.
There are very few getting £6 a week.
Take the county council worker who 15 years ago was getting something in the region of 30/- a week. Now he is getting something over £4 a week. I think it is £4 5s., which is roughly three times what he was getting 15 years ago. Here, again, I am not saying that he is getting one penny too much. I am not saying he is getting enough. All I am saying is that he is getting roughly three times what he was getting 15 years ago.
I happen to know Deputy Corish. He is a young man like myself. Does he seriously suggest that the changes which have taken place over those years, and which made an improvement in the wages of the workers necessary and will make it more necessary as time goes on, should have no effect whatever on judges and district justices? Would he like to argue that they are not entitled to one penny more nowadays than they were entitled to in 1924? We are the custodians of the rights of the poor people, of the manual worker, the agricultural labourer and the unemployed. That was an argument which, I am afraid, Deputy Everett tried to misrepresent, but it was an argumentthat was quite properly made by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Government last night.
All the lawyers back up the judges.
Curiously enough, the Labour Party do not seem to be taking Deputy Everett's line last night. Anyway, they do not seem to be consistent in their attitude on this measure. Deputy Everett took the line that he was opposing the matter on principle because some provision or other was not being made quickly enough for the workers.
I do not think that Deputy Everett opposed it very strenuously. His opposition was very mild.
He went on to say that they objected to the Bill on principle. I take it that anyone who objects to something on principle is objecting to it from a fundamental aspect. I do not care what Deputy Cowan says, but I do believe that, when a person says he is objecting to something on principle, he feels rather strongly about it. Deputy Everett appeared to me to contradict himself in the line that he took. He said that he did not believe for one moment that the members of the judiciary would become any less honest or trustworthy if they did not get this increase and, at the same time, when he was arguing about Section 12, he thought it was completely wrong to take away from the citizen the right to have his case transferred on the grounds that he did not like a particular judge. If this House can add up the logic of that then they must be better at it than I am.
Now that I mention Section 12, I may say that to some extent I agree with Deputy Cowan. In fact, all the speakers who mentioned Section 12 appeared to be against the change proposed in it. I suppose, in so far as we should not try to take away any right from the ordinary citizen, I oppose it too. In fact, it is a right which was never given to them by the law of the country; it is a right thathe thinks he has because a certain practice has grown up. I am perfectly satisfied that abuses have crept in and that there is some justification for the view that the person in applying for these transfers is abusing the rights which he was given under previous legislation in this State.
What about the State abusing it? They do it more often than other people.
The State abuses it. In view of the unanimity of opinion on all sides of the House, I think the Minister will be prepared to reconsider Section 12 of the Bill.
I have already said that in my opinion this Bill is good, but does not go far enough. It does not increase the jurisdiction of the District and Circuit Courts as much as I would like and as much as my colleagues in the solicitors' profession would like to have the jurisdiction increased.
Many people would support that view.
I am glad to hear that. I think they are not going nearly far enough as far as the District Court is concerned. The District Court was established to be a poor man's court, a court of rough justice for the man with a small grievance, but the small grievance is every bit as important, particularly in the country, to a man as the big grievance or the big action for £3,000 or £4,000, or an action between companies is to the man in the city.
The hard fact is that one of the reasons why rearrangement is overdue was mentioned by the Minister in his opening speech, that some district justices have not enough work to do. They would be the first to admit that. They would be far better pleased if they had a lot more to do. All they can do is to come to their court, get through their cases and go home. One of the reasons that so few cases are taken by district justices now is the simple economic fact that money has changed in value, that a man who would take a breach of warrantyaction in the District Court 20 years ago cannot take it now for the simple reason that any stock he would buy under £25 could be only a calf, and I never heard of a warranty being given for a calf. Even in a case involving a dispute about an animal he is forced to go through the rigmarole of going through the entire Circuit Court procedure. The affidavits are lodged. There is a defence entered. He has to have his briefs prepared for counsel. He has to have counsel in court on the occasion of the hearing, and his veterinary surgeon and other witnesses to prove that a warranty was in fact given. There are witnesses on the other side to say that the warranty was not given. There are veterinary surgeons on the other side to prove that there was no breach of warranty. The result is that if the poor fellow loses at the end of it all he has lost his animal and £100 to £150 as well.
The object of this Parliament should be to make it possible for the poor man to have his grievance adjusted one way or the other in open court at as small a cost to himself as is possible and, therefore, I think there is no answer to the argument that the jurisdiction of the District Court should be increased in contract and in tort to £100 and that the jurisdiction of the court in title cases should be established.
Here again a man may find himself in court and he may have already incurred his costs between one thing and another and the solicitor bringing witnesses in and when he is three-fourths of the way through the case some question about title arises and the next thing is that he is informed from the Bench that the case cannot be proceeded with. It does seem unfair to that man and, considering the wonderful record that the District Court has in this country since its establishment in 1934, I feel that we in this House should have no qualms whatever about giving them jurisdiction in title, up to a small amount, at any rate.
The jurisdiction of the District Court in criminal matters has been progressively increased over the years. That is evidence of the faith of this House andthe people as a whole in the ability of the District Court to decide on matters of any kind but what has been happening recently is that more and more of the cases on the civil side are disappearing from the District Court and are being forced into the Circuit Court. I think we should right that before this Bill finds its way on to the Statute Book.
In addition, I believe that what are called Section 52 cases should be capable of being heard before the District Court rather than the Circuit Court. They are simple applications upon affidavit which take up unnecessary amounts of time in a Circuit Court and which could be quite easily dealt with by a district justice. Whether he has been a solicitor or a barrister, his previous experience will have given him plenty of knowledge of the requirements of Section 52 applications.
I mentioned that, in my view, the Circuit Court jurisdiction should be increased, not to £600, as proposed in the Bill, but to £1,000, and that, thereby, the enormous volume of work which is in arrears in the High Court would be somewhat reduced and, thereby, with the addition of another High Court judge, work in the High Court could be proceeded with fairly rapidly.
It is, I must confess, very difficult for a member of the legal profession to explain to a layman who is taking an action in the High Court that his case is not likely to be heard for 12 or 18 months or maybe two years. It is hardly fair in certain cases that the worry and mental strain of a High Court action should be hanging, like a sword of Damocles, over the head of a litigant for a period of, say, two years.
Is not that due to the fact that judges work only three and a half hours a day?
No. I do not think it is at all fair to say that. I hope that when Deputy Corish speaks he will not take the line that a judge works only three and a half hours a day. He works a lot more than three and a half hours although he might sit on the bench for only three and a half hours a day.How would you like to have the responsibility of deciding whether an ordinary citizen is to be a bankrupt for the rest of his life or is going to win an action? If a High Court case goes to the Supreme Court, the judges have to listen to the arguments from both sides. If there are two judges of one view and two judges of another, the remaining judge has the responsibility of that person's future in his hands. It is all very well to talk about what a workingman does. I do not decry that, but I would not be a judge of the meanest kind for all the tea in China.
They are making case law which may guide decisions for years.
They are making decisions which will bind people from then on. In addition to that, a judge has to study and read up and obtain advice about thousands of cases which have been heard for the past 700 or 800 years to enable him to come to a proper decision. Many of them work, not three and a half hours, but sometimes 23½ hours per day for a period of a week if an important case is being heard. I am not standing up for them at all. They have their job to do and they are well paid for doing it. But they are paid, not so much for the number of hours they work, but for the great responsibility they have to undertake.
Have not they enough to live on?
No matter how stupid the O'Learys may be they have to be protected against their own stupidity.
Have they not enough to live on? I would not vote for an increase for them, anyhow.
The day may come when you will be very proud of the judiciary. The day comes in every country when the democratic institutions which it took the blood of the people to establish will depend for their survival on the integrity or otherwise of the judiciary. If you put too much of a strain on them by denying them paymentcommensurate with their ability you will know what will happen if they let you down and let down your democratic institutions.
Tell us what will happen if we let them down?
Did you ever read a history book? Did you ever see in the history of England what happened to Irish people who had to go before corrupt judges there? Did you ever read what happened to priests and laymen when they had to go to England and suffer the so-called justice of the British system? Go back to school, read your books, and you will know something about the responsibility of judges and what you will get from a corrupt judge.
You are on the legal side.
I am not a bit afraid to be on the legal side.
The members of the Labour Party can make their speeches in their own time and put forward their own views.
I will take on the whole lot of them. Deputy Hickey, who sits there in the background, knows what I am saying is very close to the truth.
The Deputy said something about Deputy O'Leary which was completely unfair.
I do not mind him. He is only a young solicitor and he might be a judge yet.
I would not take it for all the tea in China.
I will have to go out. I could not listen to a man like that defending the judges while there are 90,000 unemployed in the country. Go away out of that. You should be ashamed of wasting the time of the House.
I have tried for the past 20 minutes to make a speech and I have done my best to keepgoing despite the continuous barrage of interruptions from the Labour Party. I hope that I have made my case; I certainly tried to make it honestly. I am surprised that Deputy Costello, who led off in the debate for the other side of the House, should have availed of the opportunity to doubt the motives of the Minister in introducing this legislation.
The Parliamentary Secretary to the Government, Deputy Lynch, mentioned the establishment of a High Court in Cork. I remember when Deputy Lynch made that case in the House two years ago and built it up layer by layer in what seemed to be a very sensible and sound speech. Deputy McGilligan when speaking afterwards dismissed it in one sentence. I did not bring the reference with me, but anyone who cares can look it up. He said:—
"Let me tell Deputy Lynch that there is no case for the establishment of a High Court in Cork."
That is all he said about it. I do not think that an argument like that should be dismissed in just one sentence. As I said, our object is to try to make litigation as cheap as possible for litigants, and if the establishment of a High Court in Cork were to have the effect of decreasing the cost of High Court jurisdiction for a portion of the country, I think that proposal ought to be seriously considered.
Finally, I come back to the question as to whether the increases, which I did not refer to very much, should be given. I believe they should. I should like to wind up my speech by telling a perfectly true story of a case in court in which I was involved myself when three defendants were before a district justice on a certain charge. They pleaded that the reason why they should not be sent to jail was because they would be losing the benefit of jobs worth up to £25 per week. I remember the justice making the remark at the time: "I appear to be on the wrong side of the Bench". The fact is that he should not appear to be on the wrong side of the Bench; he should be placed in an actual position of independenceas well as being in a theoretical position of independence.
This Bill proposes to amend the Courts of Justice Acts, 1924 to 1929. I think the principal and main proposal is the increasing of the salaries of judges and justices and their pensions and sustenance allowances referred to by Deputy Flanagan. The Labour Party was brought into this debate in a rather forcible way by the previous speaker. He was endeavouring at one time to dictate to us what our policy should be. Every member of the Labour Party is well aware of that policy. We take cognisance of all sections of the community and have done so throughout the years. We realise that every man in this country is entitled to a fair and square deal and we endeavour to see that he gets it, if it is at all possible.
I should like to say at the outset that we realise fully that the judiciary should be a very independent body, and that they should be held in respect by the citizens of the State. If that position did not obtain, I know very well it would be a bad day for the community. However, Deputy Flanagan made the point that in opposing these increases the Labour Party are not consistent. It has been stated that other people in the State, workers in different classes of employment, have had their rates of remuneration increased well beyond the percentage increase that is now being sought for the members of the judiciary. I believe there is no comparison, good, bad or indifferent. Take the ordinary worker earning £3 or £4 a week. If he has got an increase of 100 per cent. in his wages within the last ten or 15 years, it only gives him a wage of £6 or £7 per week. But take 50 per cent. of £1,000, and it is an increase of £500. You cannot compare the ordinary working man with these people.
I oppose this measure wholeheartedly. I am convinced, beyond a shadow of doubt, that if it is to be passed by this House it will create a spirit of disquiet and uneasinessthroughout the country. I am perfectly satisfied that if there was a referendum of the people of this country on this particular measure, 95 per cent. of them would oppose it strenuously. There are very valid reasons why that opposition should be forthcoming. We have had here, during the past two or three years, many discussions on problems that confront our people, on the unemployment problem, the emigration problem, on social welfare legislation and measures to improve the health of our citizens.
We have had discussions on how to provide for the aged people of the country, for the widows and orphans and so on. Despite all those discussions, and despite all the sympathetic points made by some members both of the Government Party and of the Fine Gael Party, we find that the only select Committee this House has set up since I became a member of it, to go into any question deeply, was this select Committee set up consisting of 15 members of the Government Party and the principal Opposition Party, Fine Gael, with powers to send for persons, papers and documents, to consider and report whether the salaries and expenses, allowances and pensions of the judges and justices require to be increased and if so, by what amount.
I consider that that Committee should never have been set up. We had no Committee set up to inquire into how to deal with our 80,000 unemployed or to consider how the aged people of the country have to exist on a mere pittance of £1 1s. 6d. week after week, or how the unemployed man is to live on 12/- dole weekly, or to inquire how the widows and orphans, uneconomic holders, the small business people throughout the length and breadth of the country from Donegal to Cork are to live at the present time. We have no select Committee to inquire how they are to get along or whether they are being fairly treated by the State or not. I do not want to comment adversely on the judiciary. I have the greatest respect for them but I think that taking all those other factors into account, there is no justification for setting up aselect Committee of this House to consider by how much the salary of one of our citizens in receipt of £80 a week for his work, together with travelling expenses and subsistence allowance should be increased so that he would be treated with justice and fair play. I maintain he is now being treated with justice and fair play and that his remuneration of £80 a week with travelling and subsistence allowance is quite adequate. I also maintain that the other people referred to in this measure, High Court judges with £60 a week, are being well looked after and I also maintain that Circuit Court judges with remuneration similar to a Minister of State, are being very well looked after. Similarly, I maintain that district justices have very little to grieve about so far as their rate of pay is concerned. I consider that the proposal to increase their remuneration by £5 to £10 per week is most inopportune at the present time.
We all know very well that there has been a marked increase in the cost of living. We all know that it is difficult for people to provide for their families at the present time and that naturally affects the judiciary just as well as any other section, but surely to heavens, it was entirely wrong for the Government to start with a better paid section of the community. If we compare these salaries —and I put it to any sane, thinking Deputy—with the rate of pay provided for the Taoiseach, what do we find? We find that despite the big portion of work that is thrown on his shoulders, considering the major responsibilities he has to face at the present time and despite the fact that he is the man responsible for the enactment of legislation, his pay would not compare with the pay of these gentlemen. Surely he has a much more responsible job than any of these judges. He has to make the case for the Government in the House and throughout the length and breadth of the country, for Government policy and so on. Similarly, a Minister of State, having a remuneration of £2,125 — a similar amount to that of the Circuit Court Judge—has to bear very heavy responsibilities. I maintain without fear ofcontradiction that the Minister has five times the responsibility of any Circuit Court judge in this country. Therefore, there is no justification for the increase no matter from what angle we view it.
Why not come on to us—the Deputies?
There will be a time for the Deputies. We will deal with that later. In opposing as vehemently as I possibly can this measure, I want to make it clear as I have already mentioned that I take cognisance of all sections of the people but if I were to support this measure, I would not be upholding the viewpoint of my constituents in West Cork. I have not the slightest doubt that 99.9 per cent. of the people I represent here and a similar percentage of the people represented by my colleagues, Deputies Collins and O'Sullivan, if they had a say in this measure, would say, justifiably, that there was no case whatever for increasing these people's allowances. We are not taking a narrow or a sectional view on this matter at all. It is not because they are small in number that we oppose it but because, as Deputy Everett said, of the principle. We believe it is entirely unfair and entirely unjust to bring in such a measure having regard to the conditions that are obtaining in this country at the present time.
That is our clear-cut case and I cannot see for the life of me how the Government will get out of the predicament in which they will place themselves if this measure is to become law. If we were to read in the morning papers that people enjoying rates of remuneration from £35 to £80 a week were getting increases of from £5 to £10 a week, what would be the ordinary reaction? Every man throughout the length and breadth of the country would say: If these people are entitled to those increases, surely to heaven, whether I am working for wages or whether I am self-employed, I am entitled to some figure of an increase on whatever my present remuneration is. That would be a reasonable attitudefor any thinking man in the country to adopt.
How are we going to face up to the situation? I think that if the Government, as a result of this, find themselves confronted with wage increases and demands from all sections of the community—and, indeed, they will be very justifiable so far as many sections are concerned—they can only blame themselves. They are setting up a bad precedent and establishing a very bad principle. Coming here as a representative of the people of West Cork— mainly workers and small farmers, many of them living on uneconomic holdings, and also small business people whose business as a result of Government policy is declining from day to day—surely, I could not support this measure. We have had several claims locally from people whose rate of remuneration did not exceed £3 or £4 a week and we thought ourselves very lucky if we could get an increase of 5/- a week for these people. In the case of the county council, since the cost of living increased in the last few years the only increase they gave their employees was 5/- a week. In many other cases and many other types of employment, similar figures obtain. We are asked to be complacent about the condition of these people, that they are quite all right, and in the next breath we are asked to give these increases to the judiciary.
I think that it was wholly out of place for some professional Deputies who contributed to this debate to assert that if salaries were not increased there would be a possibility of corruption creeping in amongst the judiciary. Even Deputy Flanagan supported that viewpoint. Now, I am not a professional man at all, and I am satisfied beyond doubt that we have in the legal profession in this country a goodly number of men of undisputed integrity who, if they are at any time appointed to the bench, would not betray their trust. Indeed, we have people already on the bench, existing judges, and there can be no question that they would be liable to corruption even if the present allowances, which I count as very adequate,remain as they are. I think that is a grave reflection to make on members of the legal profession generally, and I am surprised to hear members of the profession themselves making that assertion here in this House. No lay member of this House attempted to make that assertion, but at least three or four Deputies attached to the profession of law did assert that there was a possibility of corruption if salaries were not increased.
A danger of corruption.
A possibility of corruption and a danger of corruption are more or less the same thing. I think the assertion that if our judges do not get increased salaries, they are likely to accept bribes and to give unfair decisions, is a sad commentary on our professional men generally. That assertion was made by, amongst others, Deputy Flanagan.
I do not want to hold up the House unduly. I regret very much that the Minister for Justice should deem it fit to bring in such a piece of legislation at this time. I suppose, in order to camouflage it a little bit, other proposals were included in this Bill. I welcome some of these proposals, such as that to give the Circuit Courts and the District Courts extended powers. I cannot for the life of me see why our District Courts cannot deal with some of the cases that have to go before the Circuit Courts at present and thus obviate much of the costs incurred by litigants. I know it is a very dangerous practice, if it could be avoided at all, to have any recourse to law and I think the same applies in other countries. It is a very costly practice as many of our people know to their grief.
It helps to educate them.
Law is dear in this country and none of the legal gentlemen who contributed to this debate has given us any helpful hint that the cost will be reduced. On the contrary, according to this measure, it is liable to become higher.
No. By increasing the jurisdiction of the lower courts you decrease costs.
I do not want to delay the House by going into that particular aspect of the matter but it is very peculiar that if people have to go before the courts with a civil action, they are faced with the problem of a huge bill of costs. I know many people who are deterred by that prospect and indeed I have advised a few in my time, who might have a reasonable case, to keep out of the courts because I believed that whether they won their case or not, in the end they would be the losers.
They also get that advice from many solicitors.
You are creating unemployment among solicitors.
It is a desirable type of unemployment to create. I agree that every help should be given to people who are unfortunate enough to be involved in litigation.
Foolish enough.
I agree. I am very glad to see that petty disputes amongst our countrymen are dying out. However, it is a marked advantage to the people that the jurisdiction of the District Courts and the Circuit Courts has been extended in civil actions. Up to the present, if the amount of damages claimed exceeded £300, the Circuit Court had no jurisdiction. You had many people who on occasions felt that they should claim £400 damages but they had to reduce their claim to £300 in order to bring it within the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court. I think that that was very unfair to these people. I am glad to see that the jurisdiction has been extended in these cases.
I think when this Select Committee was set up, one of its terms of reference should have been the question of legal fees, particularly the legal fees charged by senior counsel in this country. From some information I have got from people who had the misfortuneto have to employ these counsel, I know that their fees are very excessive——
You are on ice now.
——so much so that many people who may have had cause for litigation do not just bother about it at all. I think that the Minister for Justice and the Government should make known publicly the scale of fees for lawyers, let them be senior counsel or junior counsel.
Why should they employ them if the figure is so high? Why do they employ them if they cannot afford it?
The position is——
Deputy Murphy should not take so much advice from other Deputies. He should make his own statement.
This measure mainly deals with the pensions and allowances of members of the judiciary which indeed are very liberal. A judge after 15 years' service will get two-thirds of his remuneration as pension. That obviates the necessity of his making provision for old age. Similarly if he is retired before that time and in any case after five years' service, he will be provided with a reasonable pension by way of one-sixth of his existing salary plus one-twentieth for each year of service so that, unlike most of our employed and self-employed people, this particular class will not have to provide for their old age. People down the country when they retire at 70 after a lifetime of work have to submit themselves to a rigid means test in order to get £1 1s. 6d. per week. No matter from what angle one looks at it one cannot but find fault with the Government and the Minister for this piece of legislation. I am entirely opposed to it on principle and I appeal to the Minister, though I feel there is little use in doing so, to withdraw this measure in the interests of justice.
I regret that this debate has more or less tended to go off therails in dealing with the question of the remuneration of the judiciary while the sections of the Bill which are of supreme importance as a whole seem to have been ignored; and, as one who has advocated some of the reforms suggested in this measure over the past 15 years, I welcome the Bill so far as it goes in that direction. But I do not think the Bill goes far enough.
I agree that the judiciary must remain independent. I think Deputy Costello, however, rather overstated the case last night when he referred to that hierarchy. I will not put any haloes on any heads because they might get titled sideways. The members of the judiciary are very important public servants. The State has been very lucky in its judiciary but the members of it remain public servants paid by the taxpayers and it is quite in order, therefore, for members of this House to give their views as to how they should be paid. This Bill gives effect to the findings of the Select Committee set up by this House. That Committee went into the matter fully and made certain recommendations. I know that district justices are grossly underpaid. Beyond that, I have nothing further to say. I was rather surprised at Deputy Everett discussing a question of principle because it was Deputy Everett who, as Minister for Posts and Telegraphs, was a party to the giving of an increase of £1,000 per year to a poor man who was trying to keep the wolf from the door on £2,500 per year. That is all I shall say on the question of principle.
There are sections of this Bill which are of supreme importance to the community. There is the question of cheapening litigation and providing justice irrespective of the length of a person's purse. I assert—Deputy Costello and other legal men know this just as well as I do—that justice is purchased by the big corporations and the insurance companies in a position to buy expert legal and medical advice as against the small man without resources. There is no question of our judiciary not being above reproach,but everybody knows that what I say is true. Our entire legal system is unsuitable and the quicker this House realises that the better it will be.
Deputies have ignored the most important sections of this Bill. The quicker we get the reforms for which our people are crying out the better it will be for the country. Because of the vested interests involved we will possibly find ourselves unable to go as far as we would like to go. This country is too small to afford two branches of the legal profession. We should have a system akin to that in the United States where there is only the one branch of the profession and the people have not to pay for duplication of lawyers. That system is all right in England where there are vast resources and Sir John Blank gets £25,000 to successfully sue for divorce for Lady So-and-so from some husband of whom she has grown tired. We have not got these resources here.
Those of us who have been connected with the legal profession have seen people beggared as a result of litigation. The sooner the two branches of the profession are amalgamated the more satisfactory the position will be and the easier it will be for our people to obtain justice. That will not necessarily mean the wiping out of one branch of the legal profession, as some people seem to fear. As happens under the American system, different men will specialise in different branches of the profession. The securing of justice is limited now by the size of a man's bank balance.
I appeal to Deputies to give more consideration to the more important implications of the Bill than to the hares being raised in connection with judicial salaries. Deputy Costello seemed to think that there should be no mention of salaries at all in this measure. I do not know in what other way the matter could have been dealt with. The suggestion seemed to be that it was demeaning to the judiciary to discuss the question of their salaries here.
Deputy Costello referred to the fact that he was making the case that lawyers could not be done without. I believe they are a necessary evil, ifone considers them an evil. Deputy Costello made the case that that branch of the profession goes back to antiquity. It occurred to me that in suggesting the salaries of the judiciary should not be mentioned in the Bill he was thinking of part of his own professional judicial attire. There is a pocket on the back of a barrister's gown. In the old days barristers evidently considered it undignified to take money from a client and the result was that when a barrister walked away the client followed him and slipped the fee into this little pocket. That pocket survives to the present day as part of the regalia, but one does not have to chase a barrister around to-day in order to pay him his fee. Some progress has been made in that respect. I see nothing wrong in discussing judicial salaries here. They must be dealt with by legislation, and I do not know any more appropriate measure for that purpose than the present Bill.
Coming to the question of the decentralisation of the law, I consider the Minister has not gone nearly far enough. I think there should be an overall aim in the Minister's Department as to what the future of our legal structure is to be. In my opinion, there should be complete abolition of the High Court except as a Court of Appeal. Every action that is now tried by the High Court should be tried in the local venue by the Circuit Court judge. The position at the moment is that any case of over £300 jurisdiction has to go to the High Court. If a farm labourer is knocked down by a car in the West of Ireland and brings his case to Dublin he is faced by the wealthy insurance corporations which insure motorists. He is dragged up here and may have to hang around for a week or ten days. When the case comes on it is not a question only of lawyers but of medical experts, engineers, actuaries and other witnesses. The insurance companies have already bought and secured the services of practically every expert that can be brought into the case. While that is the position, you cannot, I suggest, have justice. Justice could not be secured for thatpoor unfortunate man because he could not possibly have the resources to enable him to employ a lot of experts. If the case were tried on his own native heath he could bring forward all his witnesses, witnesses that he could not afford to bring to Dublin. In that case, the wealthy insurance corporations would be obliged to bring their experts and their expensive lawyers for the hearing of the case to the local venue. In that event the scale of justice would again start to swing more steadily.
In order to achieve that end, I suggest to the Minister that the Circuit Court jurisdiction should at least be brought up to £1,000 in contract and in tort. I suggest that the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court should be brought up to £3,000 in equity suits and in the administration of estates. In other cases, its jurisdiction should be at least £1,000. In that way, I hope at all events to provide for a large number of people who are unable to seek justice under the system as we know it. They have not the money to enable them to employ expert witnesses.
As far as the District Court is concerned, I should say that it has given the most satisfaction of any court set up under our present system. It has been suggested by some Deputies that the district justices have not enough work to do. I propose to provide plenty of work for them. In order to cheapen litigation, I am proposing to the Minister that, in contract and tort, the jurisdiction of the District Court should be increased to £100; in ejectment cases, that it should be increased to a rent of £100 or £25 poor law valuation and that its jurisdiction in slander and libel cases where the damages sought are nominal, the figure should be £100. It should have title jurisdiction up to £25, and power for the fixing of basic rents up to £100.
Again, perhaps with more hesitation, I would give it jurisdiction under Section 52 of the Local Registration of Title Act. I would give the District Courts all licensing jurisdiction. For the life of me, I cannot understand how the Minister's backroom boys arrived at the figures in contract and tort thatare set out in the Bill. I cannot understand why a differentiation should be made as to a district justice's ability to try a contract action for £50 and suggest that he cannot try a tort action for £25. Everyone connected with the legal profession whether he be old or young knows that questions of contract are far more difficult and complex than questions of tort. I am sure that every student would admit that he found far more difficulty in trying to master Anson on contract than he did Underhill on tort. In contract actions, you are dealing largely with questions of fact. There can be some posers in regard to the law of contract because there is a complex legal code to be dealt with.
I do not know why there should be such a distinction made between these two figures which I have mentioned. I am suggesting the figure of £100. Formerly, the position was that the District Court had jurisdiction only up to £10 on questions of tort. They propose now to give it jurisdiction up to £25. In 1924, you could get a pretty good pig at the fair for £25. If a motorist hits a farmer's sow on the road now, she is going to cost more than £25. The result is that the farmer has to set off for the Circuit Court with an engineer, a vet, a barrister and a solicitor to be faced by the insurance company with an engineer, two vets, a barrister and a solicitor. If the case goes against the insurance company, it goes off on appeal to the High Court on circuit, with possibly two senior counsel on each side so that the sow is going to be a very expensive one by the time the case in finished. It is beyond me why the district justice could not deal with the farmer's sow. I see no reason why the district justices cannot and should not be able to try these ordinary cases in tort up to £100.
There is another matter I want to deal with which is of immense importance to country Deputies, and that is the question of conferring title jurisdiction on the District Court. It was the intention in the first instance, under the 1924 Act to confer title jurisdiction on the District Court up to, Ithink, £10. But again, that was ruled out. I leave it to the imagination of Deputies as to why that was done. The intention, however, that was there to confer that jurisdiction on the District Court was stultified. I think that the least jurisdiction you should give to the District Court in title is in cases up to £25. Let me give an example. Suppose Mary Brown's hen trespasses on Pat Murphy's garden. He goes into the local solicitor to have a summons for trespass issued. The question is raised at once as to who owns the fence. Immediately, there is a question of title involved. They are both off to the Circuit Court, complete with engineers, maps and barristers, so that in order to have this woman's hen kept at bay a tremendous amount of expense is put on these unfortunate people. I have seen them beggared for all time over matters of this kind simply because there is a question of title raised in the District Court. The district justice has to throw it out and off they go with all the pomp and panoply of the law and the professional witnesses to the Circuit Court. If there is a dispute about a boreen and who has the right to use it there is the very same thing. Often, the litigants and their families are beggared for years afterwards as a result. Always remember that once any of these things must start in the Circuit Court, the ultimate end is the High Court on circuit with senior and junior counsel in these small cases. I often thought it was a tragedy but there it is. We have the opportunity to put it right.
I want to deal with this matter and I want the Minister to deal with it. 99.9 per cent. of title cases are questions solely of fact. Unless you have a common-sense parish priest who is active enough or some local good neighbour who will try to knock some sense into these people, they proceed on this disastrous way. I want to provide sufficient jurisdiction in the District Court to enable Pat Murphy to keep his neighbour's hen at bay without proceeding to the Circuit Court and High Court. I hope the Minister and all sides of the House will see the fundamental logic of this, and provide for it in this Bill.
It has been suggested that questions of slander or libel should not be dealt with in the District Court. I do not know why they should not be. I would say that in 90 per cent. of these cases all that the plaintiff wants is a declaration to clear his character. In 90 per cent. of the cases that is what the case is brought for. You will get an odd one who is looking for heart balm or damages and these, I suppose, would be started in the High Court in any case. Cases of this kind often occur particularly with country people. For instance, there may be some row about trespass, or something like that, and things are said, possibly in the heat of the moment, that get around. The result often is that instead of the matter ending with a District Court summons the parties concerned embark on the long trail up through the Circuit and High Court, when in reality, all that is required by the plaintiff is a declaration that the words spoken were defamatory and that there was no truth in them in substance or in fact. I would give the District Court that power. It would be the cheapest and most expeditious way of dealing with matters of that kind.
I will not detain the House too long on the question of basic rents and ejectments. Suffice it to say that with the decrease in the value of money the former jurisdiction is rather absurd. It simply does not exist. I am sure there are very few houses let at 10/- a week now. From the point of view of expedition and of cheapening litigation for the litigants, I again say that basic rents up to £100 and ejectment cases up to rents of £100 or valuations not exceeding £25 should be dealt with in the District Court.
If these matters are considered seriously by the Minister and by the House, the Minister may find that it will be unnecessary to appoint an extra High Court judge. Whether it is necessary or unnecessary, the principles that I am talking about are far more important to the public. The provision of quick and cheap litigation for the public, where it is essential, is far more important to the people than the question of whetheryou have to appoint another judge or not.
As I have already said, the overall aim should be to turn the High Court into a Court of Appeal from the decisions of the Circuit Court where these are found to be unsatisfactory by either party and that ultimately we should be striving at the goal where the administration of justice as far as the courts are concerned would be completely decentralised and where the smallest man, the poorest labourer in the parish to the highest in the land will have equal opportunities and equal rights before the Bar of Justice.
If Deputies—I am referring particularly to Deputies on the other side of the House—agree with the suggestions that I have put forward on this Bill, we can make a good Bill of this Bill. We can provide greater reliefs and do greater good to the people than was done in any Bill that has come before this House as long as I have been here. I am not overestimating the importance of the provisions I have suggested to the House. I would suggest to the Minister—I feel very strongly in this matter—that he should accept the figures I have suggested. I would go much further in this line were it not that I am hoping, if I can get a consensus of opinion behind me in this House for the suggestions I have made in regard to this Bill, that it will just be the start towards achieving the goal I want to reach.
May I say also that I have given not only my own views here? I have consulted Bar associations in the West of Ireland who agree with the figures I have suggested in the House. The vast majority of these men are opposed politically to me but they realise the logic of my propositions. I appeal to the men on all sides of the House to realise that we have an opportunity now of doing a tremendous service to the poorer sections of this community. We have an opportunity now to improve tremendously our judicial system. I hope that I and the Minister will get the co-operation of thinking men on all sides of the House on the Committee Stage of this Bill to bring the Bill atleast to the stage to which I want it brought.
At the outset, I should like to inform the Minister as a member of one of the Opposition Parties that I thoroughly agree with everything said by Deputy Moran. I say that as a Deputy representing a rural constituency and as a solicitor. Everything he has said, in my view, is in the interests of the people of the country generally.
And long overdue.
And long overdue. There is one thing which strikes me about this Bill and will really corroborate what Deputy Moran has said. There appears to be general agreement in this House that district justices have too little to do and that there are not sufficient High Court judges to do the work. All that Deputy Moran suggests is that we should level matters up. If the district justices have nothing to do, it is because money has lost its value, and by raising the jurisdiction of the District Courts we will give the district justices something to do, probably more than they want to do. We will possibly avoid the necessity for doing away with the existing number of justices and there may even be no necessity for an additional High Court judge, because there will not be the same accumulation of work in the High Court if we increase the jurisdiction of the District Courts and the Circuit Courts.
Some time ago this House set up a Select Committee to inquire into the various sections of this Bill. I am very sorry that the Labour Party was not represented on that Committee. I am very sorry that, through their own fault, they had not an opportunity of putting their views before the members of that Committee. I am also sorry, that Committee having gone to the trouble of going into this matter in detail, that the Minister has been unable to accept the unanimous opinion of that Committee. If the Committee decided to increase the salaries of district justices, Circuit Court judges and High Court judges and to make that increase retrospectivefrom a certain date, I am sorry the Minister did not see his way to accept that unanimous recommendation.
I think, however, that the Minister set a very good precedent by setting up that Select Committee. I think he could go further and do a considerable amount of good to the judiciary by setting up a Select Committee of the House, with the Ceann Comhairle or the Leas-Cheann Comhairle in the Chair, for the appointment of personnel to our judiciary and not make purely political appointments to the judicial benches. We are now giving these gentlemen who preside over our courts a very good salary, a salary on which they can live, and we should see that they are men, as they have been in the past, who are impartial; and we should get the very best men procurable for these appointments. I respectfully suggest to the Minister that a Committee be set up, that applications be invited for the various vacancies when they occur, and that that Committee should make representations to the Minister with regard to the appointment of the various justices, Circuit Court judges and High Court judges. That is a suggestion which he should consider.
A Committee of the House?
Yes, a Committee of the House.
You will always have a majority of one Party on it.
That should not be necessary if you put the Ceann Comhairle in the Chair and make the numbers even as between the Government and the Opposition.
But that unfortunate man belongs to a Party.
Why did you not suggest that to the former Minister?
If I were a member of this House then I would have. I do not say anything in this House except what I believe. If I were a memberof this House, I would have made that suggestion to the former Minister.
You were here five years ago.
I was not here five years ago. The Deputy's memory is not as good as it was.
He was elected at a by-election.
I never had an opportunity of saying that, but I am saying it now. I do not wish to pursue that matter further, but it is something which the Minister should seriously consider. I am surprised to hear Deputy McGrath objecting to the suggestion. If it is not possible to set up a Select Committee from this House, it might be possible to set up a committee from the Bar Council and the solicitors' profession and have the Minister as the chairman.
Another I.M.A.
Possibly it is much better to have that than to have the plums of office made the reward of political work. The chance of reaching the judicial bench depends on the number of speeches you make for a political Party. That is what it boils down to. Nobody can deny that. I am not charging the present Government.
It has been the system.
Yes, it has been the system. It is something from which we can possibly get away. I do not suggest that we can do it, but it is something worth consideration.
The Attorney-General is generally the next High Court judge.
Usually, he is a defeated Government candidate. I am not referring to the present Government.
Are you forgetting Fionán Lynch's appointment?
We are talking aboutthe system, and exceptions very often prove the rule.
There were far more exceptions than that.
I do not know.
Mr. Boland
I will convince the Deputy of that some time.
I would be glad to be convinced.
Mr. Boland
I did it when in opposition. I proved to the people who were then over here that that was not the case as far as I was concerned and I can do it again.
I would be surprised if over the years we had 100 per cent. monopoly of one particular Party on the Bench. I would be disappointed to hear that they had 100 per cent. On the question of the appointment of district justices, there is another point which I would put to the Minister. If we appoint a district justice to preside over a District Court in rural Ireland, let us appoint someone who knows something about rural Ireland. I am not criticising the justices who preside over the District Courts, but it is unfair to ask a solicitor or barrister practising in the city to go down into a rural district and adjudicate in cases about bridges and drains and bullocks and heifers, something he knows absolutely nothing about. It is really a laughing-stock at times to the countryman to hear such a justice decide some of these cases, all through no fault of his own.
It is his own fault to accept the job if he knows he is not competent to discharge the duties.
We have a lot of people who accept jobs and who are not capable of discharging the duties. Unfortunately, they never can see it themselves; it is only the people on the ditch who can see it. I appeal to the Minister to consider the litigants who are going before the district justices. I would ask him also to consider the question of the Irish language. The late District Justice Walsh was responsible for endeavouring to encourage the Irish language.
There are no more Walshes on the Bench these days.
Unfortunately, there are not. He was responsible for the introduction of a scheme whereby Irish-speaking Guards were transferred to Irish-speaking districts and the courts were presided over by Irish-speaking district justices. The Gardaí were paid additional salaries for being stationed in these areas and I understand district justices got certain privileges—the privilege, for instance, of remaining on until they were 70 years of age for presiding over courts in Gaeltacht areas. I had the privilege of practising in those courts and I had the privilege of practising in the District Courts where 100 per cent. of the litigation was done through the medium of Irish. The district justice gave his decision in the Irish language, and heard the evidence of litigants in Irish; solicitors cross-examined in Irish, but I am very sorry to say that that is a thing of the past. Two per cent. of the litigation is no longer done through the medium of Irish.
Mr. Boland
That shows the district justices do not have Irish—is that what the Deputy means?
That is not correct. It is due to the district justices not understanding the dialect of the people in that particular locality; that is the trouble. They do not understand a witness who is speaking in the vernacular and neither does the litigant understand the district justice who is speaking in a different dialect. In any of the Gaeltacht areas in the West, either the north or south—Deputies on all sides of the House who live in the Gaeltacht know—Gaelic in the courts is a thing of the past. Let it be no longer a pretext for an appointment. But it could be revived and could be of some assistance, if the Irish language is worth reviving, and God knows, that is debatable at the moment.
I join with Deputy Moran in asking the Minister to increase the jurisdiction of the district court and to puttort on a par with contract. If there are Deputies in this House who do not understand the meaning of tort and contract, let me try to put it in very simple language. When this Bill comes into law, take the case of a man going to the fair with two heifers worth, say, £26 apiece. He gives a warranty with one of the animals on the fair and eventually is sued on that warranty. When this Bill becomes law he may be sued in the District Court, because the price of the animal is under £50. He may be sued in the District Court because it is on a breach of contract he will be sued. But take the second animal valued at the same price of £26, and say on the way home from the fair a motor collides with the animal which is injured and has to be destroyed. If the owner decides to sue the owner of the motor car, he cannot do it in the came court, because it exceeds the jurisdiction of the court, because the value of the animal is £26. Unless he wishes to sue for a lesser value, he must sue in the Circuit Court and to sue in the Circuit Court it is usual to employ a counsel not merely on the hearing, but to draft the proceedings, and, as we all know in running-down actions, there is always an insurance company to hold that big stick over the head of the plaintiff—the threat of an appeal.
I know of a case in the Circuit Court where an animal valued at £11 10s. was injured as a result of which it had to be destroyed, and the plaintiff obtained a decree in the Circuit Court. From that decree, the insurance company appealed to the High Court on circuit and the plaintiff succeeded, but I am going to tell this House that the costs and expenses amounted to £45 on a decree for £11 10s. The thing is outrageous.
I shall not repeat arguments made by Deputy Moran in this House but they were correct and I would ask the Minister to pay attention to every one of them. Put tort on a par with contract. Increase jurisdiction. By doing so, you will avoid the necessity of appointing an additional High Court judge and you will give plenty of work to the districtjustices who are presiding over these District Courts to-day.
I also agree that there should be some jurisdiction given to the District Courts on the question of slander. All over the country, we Irish unfortunately are very prone to slander. One thing we cannot do is keep our tongues quiet about our neighbour. We are prone to slander and there is no person who knows that better than the country solicitor. Take the case of Mary Brown calling Mary Black out of her name—I will put it mildly. She goes to her solicitor. Now, it is but right that Mary Black should have her character cleared, but if she wants to do so she can only do it in the Circuit Court, a most expensive procedure. A solicitor usually issues a summons for threatening and abusive language to have Mary Brown bound to the peace and if there is a very astute solicitor for the defence he can raise so many hares that eventually the case is thrown out and poor Mary Brown is in a worse state than ever she was because it is then thought locally that the district justice confirmed or affirmed what was said about her. For goodness' sake, give us jurisdiction even for £10 on the question of slander and it will stop the tongues from wagging.
Mr. Boland
I am afraid it would not. I do not believe a bit of it.
Are we prone to slander or to going to the courts about it?
We cannot go to the court.
To any court?
We are prone to slander for which we have no redress in the District Court.
But are we prone to slander or to going to the courts about it?
Both, I should say.
You could say we are prone to both. I know that Deputies on all sides of the House areinclined to make a laugh of this—I am not referring to Deputy Corish. They may say: "Ah, the solicitors are trying to bring more work for themselves." I can tell the Minister, and I will tell him honestly, that 90 per cent. of the solicitors of this country do not want to appear in court ever. They are as nervous about going to the court as the Government is about going to the country.
Mr. Boland
I cannot believe Deputy O'Donnell would be nervous of anything.
A Deputy
Which Government?
We have only one at the moment. We may have another very shortly. A solicitor appearing in court is only wasting his time; he has enough chamber work to do. Country solicitors do not want this cheap litigation but they must placate their clients. There are solicitors in Dublin who will not appear in court and most country solicitors do not want to appear in court. They are much better employed in their own offices attending to their chamber business. It does not pay the solicitor to appear in the District Court and do not think it is for the purpose of increasing litigation that these suggestions are being made. But we do know the problems, and I say it without fear of contradiction, that the solicitors and clergymen know more of the problems of the people of rural Ireland than anybody else.
I would ask the Minister to pay heed to it. We are not advocating this for any financial gain of our own. It is only when a solicitor has to explain to an unfortunate client that as the law stands he has no redress, that we realise the wrong the Legislature is doing to the people of rural Ireland. Knowing that, we make this appeal to the Minister and, if he does accept it, it will cost less than the Labour Party think it will cost by way of increased salaries.
I do not agree with Deputy O'Donnell that the people of Ireland are more prone to slander than the people of any other country. We are prone to many things, I will admit,but I do not think that we are more prone to slander than any other people. In regard to the Bill itself, I support very strongly the points made by Deputy Moran. I was pleased to hear a member of the Government Party and a member of the legal profession advocate the reforms which he suggested. I would go further and suggest that district justices should be given jurisdiction even to a higher amount than he mentioned. Men who are appointed as district justices are generally men with a good knowledge of law and I cannot understand why the poor people of this country, and, indeed, the people generally, should be deprived of a chance of getting justice in the cheapest way possible. So far as the Circuit Court is concerned, I am in entire agreement with the suggestion that the jurisdiction should be raised to £1,000. I have been before the High Court on many occasions in connection with certain claims, particularly workmen's compensation claims, and I think it is a tragedy to see the amount of money that is spent sometimes on legal expenses in an effort to get justice for these people.
I happened to be called as a witness in an action at one time. We were called to Dublin the night before the case was heard and we had an interview with a member of the legal profession which, of course, involved added expense for the person who was seeking justice. The widow of the man —he had unfortunately been killed— and six witnesses had to come to Dublin and on the following day we went to court. There was a leading counsel, a junior counsel, and a solicitor involved on each side. There were Civic Guards and a surveyor also. It took two days to hear the case and the woman was awarded £900 compensation. The insurance company appealed the case. I do not know what system was in operation then, but none of the witnesses was called before the Appeal Court. The result of the appeal was that the claim was dismissed and the widow got nothing at all because of some technicality. I am satisfied that it is unfair to ordinary people to be brought up to Dublin in that way and to have to stay threenights in the city because of the mere fact that the High Court cannot travel to Cork, Limerick, Galway or Sligo to hear cases there. I think that is a matter of which the Minister should take very serious notice. If the judges are there to dispense justice there is no reason at all why they should not travel to Cork, Limerick or anywhere else when there is business in these districts. That is another reason why I think the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court should be increased up to claims of £1,000.
I would appeal to the Minister to pay some heed to the representations made by Deputy Moran who has considerable knowledge and experience of the conditions which obtain in County Mayo. I speak with some knowledge and experience also of cases with which I have had to deal from time to time in Cork. I think the time has arrived, even if it necessitates the setting up of a special Committee of the Dáil, to arrive at some arrangement whereby the administration of justice will be made less costly for ordinary people. I endorse everything that Deputy Moran has said. I hope the Minister will not alone take due notice of that but will implement most of the reforms he has advocated. I am 100 per cent. with him in the statement he has made.
I listened to some of the speeches in regard to the increased salaries for judges and I was rather surprised to hear some of the points made by Deputy Flanagan in justification of that proposal. We do not object to our district justices and judges being paid properly but the implication in some of the statements made here was that our judges or district justices cannot be trusted to observe honesty in their decisions, to deal in an honest way with the people or to display integrity in the discharge of their duties unless we pay them a very big salary. I am not at all convinced that is a decent way to approach the matter. A man should, of course, be paid a salary to keep him above the temptations of life but I think our judges are being paid that salary at the moment. A man could have £10,000 a year and still live beyond it,similarly a man may have £3,000 and live beyond it but we must have some regard for the people who are seeking to get justice. Are we to accept it that the people, whom I would call the unprivileged classes, are expected to have all the virtues and all the honesty notwithstanding the economic pressure on them from day to day and that there is to be no question of tempting them while the man on the bench, who is expected to administer justice, must get anything over £3,000 a year before he can be trusted to give justice to the people who have recourse to the courts?
I do not agree with the statements of certain Deputies about the danger of corruption. Deputy Flanagan quoted some cases in England and referred to the danger of democratic institutions breaking down because of corruption in the administration of justice. His argument did not convince me at all. Where corruption crept in, it arose from something other than the mere fact of insufficient remuneration or salaries. Do we not all know that corruption takes place even in countries where judges have salaries of £20,000 a year just as well as in countries where they are at the bottom of the scale? We, in the Labour Party, are not inclined to deal with this question in any petty way but we feel that our judges are sufficiently paid in the present circumstances of the country. We are not averse to giving these people a status that will remove them from any temptation or danger of corruption but I detest the idea of anybody telling us that, if we do not pay these men £3,000 or £4,000 each as salary per year, there is a danger of corruption creeping into the judiciary. I cannot forget the temptations and the economic pressure to which thousands and thousands of our people who have to go into court very often are subjected but there is no talk about lifting that economic pressure from them. A man subjected to economic pressure may sometimes be driven to steal and I would appeal to both sides of the House to get down to the problem of doing something to prevent such people from having recourse to crime. It is not by giving ajudge who is already getting £3,000 a year an increase on top of that that you will solve that problem.
I do not want to repeat what has been said already by Deputy O'Donnell and Deputy Moran. Deputy Moran covered most of the points in relation to the cost incurred by people seeking justice in our courts. Deputy Moran mentioned rights-of-way. I have often sat in the body of the court while cases in connection with rights-of-way were being heard. Many times I have seen cases stopped because it was discovered that the District Court had not jurisdiction to adjudicate in the particular matter, and the case had to be transferred to the Circuit Court. I appeal to the Minister to consider seriously the suggestion made by both Deputy Moran and Deputy O'Donnell in relation to increasing the jurisdiction of both the District Court and the Circuit Court. The Minister should ensure, too, that the High Court would travel to areas like Cork for the purpose of hearing cases and avoid the necessity of bringing litigants and witnesses to Dublin in order to procure justice.
I do not intend to go minutely into the provisions of this Bill because I think the legal profession is sufficiently well represented here to do that. I join in the appeal made to the Minister by Deputies to take notice of the suggestions made by Deputy Moran. I think those suggestions would help to reduce the cost of litigation. The principal reason why I intervene is to support the proposition put forward by the Parliamentary Secretary to the Government, Deputy Lynch, for the establishment of the High Court in Cork. This Bill provides for the appointment of an additional High Court judge. I understand the case has been made that arrears of work exist at the moment in the High Court because there are not sufficient judges.
The legal profession in Cork is under the impression that the Minister is in favour of establishing a High Court in Cork as soon as this Bill goes through. I understand the legal profession in Dublin invited a deputation from the Southern Law Association before thisBill was introduced to support them in their demand for an extra High Court judge. I believe they gave the Southern Law Association the impression that they were in favour of establishing a High Court in Cork. There is plenty of accommodation in Cork Courthouse. There are two court rooms as big as any in Dublin in which the High Court and Circuit Court could conveniently sit and the Bankruptcy Court in Cork could, as it has been in the past, be availed of by the District Court.
We hear a good deal about decentralisation and I think the establishment of a High Court in Cork would be a step in the right direction. It would save a good deal of unnecessary expense. It would save witnesses being brought up to Dublin and remaining there for several days, returning home to Cork for the week-end and coming back to Dublin again the following week. That sort of thing discourages anyone of moderate means from trying to get justice. There is no reason why these cases should not be heard in Cork. Possibly some of the lawyers in this House who practise in the Four Courts would object to that because they could not conveniently attend the Dáil after their day's work. Deputy McGilligan, as Deputy S. Flanagan pointed out, simply dismissed the idea of a High Court in Cork and said it could not materialise. I see no reason why it should not.
There is a reasonably well equipped law library in the courthouse in Cork. I am informed that a minor amendment of the High Court Rules and a simple extension of the Jurors Act is all that is required. I appeal to the Minister finally to make up his mind and establish a High Court in Cork. I would like the Minister when replying to tell us if there is any reason for not establishing a High Court in Cork. The fact that members of this House practise in the Four Courts and can conveniently attend the Dáil is not sufficient reason in my estimation for compelling people to come up to Dublin from Munster in order to procure justice. The Minister should seriously consider extending the jurisdiction of both the Circuit and District Courts. That would ease theburden on those compelled to go into court and save a lot of unnecessary expense.
I did not intend to take part in the discussion on this measure because I think that when a member of a profession or occupation takes an active part in a discussion that concerns his profession or occupation the position is always invidious since he is open to the imputation that he has an axe to grind.
There is, however, one section in this Bill that I would ask the Minister to reconsider. I refer to the provision relating to the transfer of trials from the Circuit Court to the Central Criminal Court. I appreciate the arguments that can be put forward in support of the provision contained in the Bill. I am quite prepared to admit that in a number of cases that right has probably been abused but I think the number of cases in which it has been abused is not very high and it is always rather dangerous to deprive an accused person of a right. In some cases that can perpetrate an injustice against the accused person. For that reason I appeal to the Minister to reconsider Section 12 and the amendments of the original Act. In a great many cases it is an advantage for an accused person to have the right to have his trial transferred to Dublin to the Central Criminal Court. If there has been an increase in the number of applications made for the transfer of trials from the Circuit Court to the Central Criminal Court, I think that is in large part due to the fact that sufficient consideration is not paid by the Chief State Solicitor's Office or those in charge of prosecutions to the convenience of the accused person. I do not say that by way of criticism of the Chief State Solicitor's Office or the officers in charge of prosecutions. Naturally, in dealing with the question of work, they very often are inclined to overlook the convenience of the accused person. I think that the Minister should be slow to alter the position that has existed. I am prepared, immediately, to grant to him that, undoubtedly, from time to time that provision will be used unnecessarily. Yet, I think it is a valuable right for the accused person,and I would ask the Minister not to interfere with the position that has existed in that regard.
A great many points have been made by Deputies and on these I should like to put forward one or two considerations. There is the feeling, very often, that judges in court do not work hard enough and that their hours of sitting are not long enough. I think that view is usually put forward by people who do not appreciate the actual difficulties and the working of the courts. Most courts sit from 11 o'clock—sometimes from 10.30—until 4 o'clock. That sounds very short. It is, of course, a short day if you were to take it that that was the working day of the average judge or average lawyer. Their working days are indeed far longer. The working day of the average lawyer is far in excess of the working day of a member of any other profession; but these are not the really material considerations. These hours of sittings were fixed largely to suit the convenience of litigants, of witnesses and of jury men.
Take the position which obtains in the country, for instance. Take the position that obtains in the case of appeals to the High Court on circuit in the country. Deputy Moran is here and will bear me out on this. You have the High Court sitting in Castlebar to hear appeals from all over the County Mayo. The litigants and the witnesses have to travel maybe 40 or 50 miles to the court. When they reach the town they must have an opportunity of seeing their counsel and solicitor to discuss the case. As matters stand at the moment they have to leave their homes at an early hour to rach the place where the court is being held by at least 10 o'clock in the morning. That very often means that they have to leave home at 7 or 8 o'clock in the morning.
Likewise, these hours of sittings were fixed also to suit the convenience of jury men. Take Dublin for example. The Jury men are mainly business people. They at least are in the position that they are able to go to their place of business in the morning before going to court and can go back to itafter four o'clock. In that way, they are able to attend to some of their private business while serving on a jury. If you lengthen the hours of sittings you are going to make it very difficult for them to do that.
As far as the judges are concerned, it would be quite erroneous to have the impression that their work finishes at four o'clock or begins at 11 o'clock. I think anyone who has any knowledge of the work of the High Court will know that there are many judgments held up owing to the fact that the judges have not the time to write them. The court work is only, if you like, the result of the ancillary work that has been done. I think that allowance has to be made.
Deputy McGrath made an appeal for a special High Court in Cork. I would not like to have that whole question examined on the basis of the requirements of Cork by itself. I think there is a strong case to be made, a case which might not be very popular, but a case which I think is worth examining, that original jurisdiction should be given to the High Court right through the country. If you are going to have original jurisdiction given to the High Court outside of Dublin, then I do not see why it should be limited to Cork. Some means should be devised whereby it would apply to the whole country. Obviously, if there is going to be a High Court sitting in Cork, then Galway, Limerick and other places will put forward a claim that they should have High Court sittings as well. I think it is a case worth examining, the question whether or not the High Court on circuit and the Circuit Court should be given original jurisdiction. It does not arise on this Bill and I mention it merely in passing.
On the question of the independence of the judges, I think there is one matter that has been overlooked by some Deputies who spoke. One of the important things, I think, in regard to the judiciary is to ensure that they will be independent, independent not merely in the sense of being independent of debt, but that they should be placed in a position where they will not have to come in contact with thepublic in the area in which they operate. I think that is important, because justice must not only be fair but must appear to be fair. If you were to find a judge having his meals with litigants or with lawyers in a public hotel, though they may never discuss the case and may never refer to any law case at all, nothing will eradicate the suspicion from the minds of the people who see them sitting there that they have done so. You would have the same suspicion if judges were seen having a drink with litigants or lawyers in the lounge of a hotel. It would be suspected that they were selling the pass. We are rather suspicious minded in that way and it is important to ensure that, whatever provision we make for the judiciary, they should be left in a position of complete independence where they will be above suspicion from that point of view.
Several references have been made to increasing the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court and the District Court. I think there is a strong case for increasing the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court. I would ask the Minister, however, not to do it too rapidly or too radically, for this reason, that it is virtually unheard of to have a jury action in the Circuit Court. Jury actions are determined by the High Court. I know that a litigant has the right to insist on having a jury in the Circuit Court, but that in practice it is never availed of. I think there would be many practical difficulties in the way of securing juries in the Circuit Court. Accordingly, if its jurisdiction is raised to a high level, it means that litigants and mainly poor litigants will be deprived of the opportunity of having a jury to determine their cases. I think that is the strongest argument against increasing the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court.
I would ask the Minister to be slow in yielding to any demands that the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court should be raised to a very high level. I admit, of course, that it has to be raised by reason of the changes in the value of money. There are many alluring arguments which can be put forward by Deputies in suggesting ahigher figure, but I think the Minister should bear in mind that, when he does that, he is, in effect, depriving the smaller litigants of the opportunity of having a jury.
Mr. O'Higgins
I think that inevitably on a Bill of this kind, which is not a controversial Bill, there should be different approaches and a difference of opinion as to the provisions contained in it. I certainly find myself in disagreement with some of the views expressed by my colleagues here on certain details in the Bill.
As I see it, the problem which faces the Minister at the moment in relation to the new Courts of Justice Bill is the problem created by the large cost of litigation in certain respects. It is true that many actions at present tried in the High Court are very costly for one side or the other. They are costly either for an unsuccessful plaintiff or for a defendant who may have to pay damages. It has become the habit of ignorant people, and, I regret to say, many members of this House, to regard the cost of litigation as being merely the professional charges paid to solicitor and fees paid to counsel. In fact those particular charges are strictly controlled on a scale laid down many, many years ago and they by no means represent the real cost of litigation nowadays. The cost of litigation is measured often by the expenditure necessary to bring to the High Court in Dublin a great number of witnesses and to maintain them during the period a trial may be proceeding or during whatever waiting period circumstances may make necessary. The position at the moment in relation to High Court actions is that the costs of bringing a case to trial in Dublin represented by travelling and other incidental expenses in the city, have made litigation a very burdensome business.
In so far as the Minister proposes to deal with that problem on the same basis and following the same policy as was behind the Courts of Justice Act, 1924, I find myself in complete agreement with him. The idea of the Courts of Justice Act, 1924, the parent Act, was to give the people, not a pale shadow of aformer British court but a real local court in which they could have their claims and grievances tried by a local judge. In 1924, almost 30 years ago, it was thought necessary that the jurisdiction of the local Circuit Court should be a jurisdiction limited by the sum of £300 and that the jurisdiction of the District Court in contract should be £25 and in tort £10. It does not appal me now, nearly 30 years later, that the Government should propose substantially to increase the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court and the jurisdiction of the District Court. It seems to me inevitable that a substantial increase should be made in the jurisdiction of both those courts if we are merely to maintain the idea behind the parent Act.
If I find, as I do, that in increasing the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court the Minister is to a certain extent helping to solve the problem created by present day costs of litigation, I find myself in agreement with him. It has always seemed wrong to me that the smaller kinds of actions, either in contract or in tort, that 30 years ago would have been regarded as substantial actions in the Circuit Court should, by reason of the fall in the value of money, be driven for trial into the High Court, with the consequences of expense and matters of that kind. I always regarded that as wrong and I welcome the fact that many of those actions now can be tried in the very same court as they would have been tried in after the passing of the parent Act in 1924.
In proposing that increase in the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court the Minister is doing the correct thing. There might be a difference of opinion as to whether the new jurisdiction should be, as proposed, £600 or something slightly smaller but it does seem clear that the jurisdiction should be substantially increased. By increasing that jurisdiction and taking away a number of cases that are not really High Court actions the Minister will be reducing to that extent the costs of litigation. To that extent I find myself in agreement with the policy behind the Bill. There are, however, other matters which arise in connection withthe Bill that I would like to mention. Broadly speaking, the main features of this Bill, so far as the structure of our courts is concerned, are: an increase in the jurisdiction of two local courts and an increase in the number of judges in the High Court and a reduction in the number of judges in the Circuit Court. Those appear to be the four major aspects of this short Bill—increase the work to be done in the District Court; increase the work to be done in the Circuit Court; reduce the work to be done in the High Court; increase the number of judges in the High Court; reduce the number of judges in the Circuit Court and in the District Court.
To me, prima facie, this appears to be a most illogical course of conduct. When this Bill passes into law the amount of work to be done in the High Court will be to a certain extent reduced, but there will be an extra High Court judge. I can see reason for that and I certainly do not oppose it but when I come to the Circuit Court and find that in every circuit town in the country—there can be no doubt about this—the number of actions to be tried will increase substantially and, in addition, that the work of the District Court, particularly in rural areas, will be substantially increased, I cannot see on what basis it is proposed that the number of circuits and, incidentally, circuit judges and the number of districts should be reduced. If a reduction in the circuits is carried out as proposed, in a very short space of time, a year or two, it will be the responsibility of the Minister for Justice of the day to seek sanction from the Dáil again to increase the number of circuit judges, perhaps indeed, by more than one. I am afraid that, with regard to that matter, I must express disagreement with the Minister.
Of course, there was the problem, as the Deputy knows, of the 100 day a year circuit sittings.
Mr. Boland
Less.
A circuit judge was sitting less than 100 days in the year.
Mr. O'Higgins
I have no doubt that in relation to some circuits a certainamount of reorganisation may be necessary, but I cannot think of any group of three counties, when this Bill becomes law, that will get what we ought always to aim at, a situation in which there will be a speedy hearing for litigation. You will not get that under this Bill if you reduce the number of Circuit Court judges. Imagination bogs at what will happen in the Dublin Circuit Court if this Bill becomes law. Even at the moment, with completely inadequate jurisdiction, the arrears in civil actions, in my opinion, are a scandal.
At the moment in the Dublin Circuit Court, if notice of trial is served to-day, the litigant will be extremely lucky if he gets a trial in 12 months' time. That situation will be made considerably worse because the number of cases to be tried in the Circuit Court will be substantially increased. Do not let the Minister think that will be offset by the fact that the smaller cases will henceforth be tried in the District Courts, cases of tort up to £25 and contract up to £50. In fact, the number of substantial cases, which ordinarily take longer than smaller ones, and cases of some importance to litigants will begin to accumulate in the different Circuit Courts.
I do not think that at a time like this, when it is proposed to increase the jurisdiction of both these local courts, it is wise to experiment in the way now proposed, to experiment by radically altering circuits and District Court areas and reducing the number of Circuit Court judges and district justices. If an experiment of that kind were to be made, it might be wiser to defer it for the moment and to see what effect this increase in jurisdiction is likely to have on circuits.
While I am on the matter, may I also refer to another question which arises from the alteration in circuits? In Section 15 it is proposed to give the Government power themselves to alter the existing circuits and there is a similar power with regard to the District Court areas. I hope it will be realised by the Government thatover the years a number of barristers have built up a livelihood on existing circuits, men who have during their years of practice at the Bar consistently practised in a particular group of counties and have followed consecutively the Circuit Court judges in different towns. If an alteration in these circuits takes place of a drastic kind, they may find that, while heretofore they practised extensively in, say, the towns of Portlaoise and Tullamore, these towns are in different circuits and it is quite impossible to pursue the practice they have built up. That would be a very serious harm to them. While I hope it may be possible by amendment to safeguard their position later, I should like to suggest to the Minister that no action should be taken with regard to that alteration in circuits without consultation with the interests affected—by that I mean the members of the Circuit Court Bar who may be affected—and without a real effort to ensure that Circuit Court sittings in the different towns will not clash, if that can be avoided.
I should also like to join with the Deputies who have questioned the wisdom of Section 12. I should like to hear what sound reason can be advanced for depriving accused persons of the right they now have to a transfer of their trial to the Central Criminal Court. I do not mean this offensively, but Section 12 is a section that could well have been drafted in the Attorney-General's office, that could well have gone there from the Chief State Solicitor's office, and could well have gone there from the offices of the prosecuting superintendents, because it is an Attorney-General's section. I do not think we should quietly pass a section of that kind without very careful consideration.
Mention has also been made of giving the District Court jurisdiction in title. I must say that I have an open mind on that. I do not think it would matter very much whether or not that court was given a small jurisdiction in title. There is one other suggestion I should like to make to the Minister with regard to the CircuitCourt. I concede that the jurisdiction of that court must be increased and I concede also that we should all endeavour to make it a court which will cater for as many cases as possible in the different Circuit Court areas.
I move the adjournment of the debate.
Debate adjourned.