I express my disappointment that the Minister for Justice did not choose to come into the House to reply to this matter.
Adjournment Debate. - Ballina (Mayo) District Court Clerk.
She is abroad on official business.
Alternatively, while I have the greatest respect for the Minister of State at the Department of Education, one of her junior Ministers at the Department of Justice should have taken the matter if she was unavailable.
The District Court office at Ballina, County Mayo, has a complement of two District Court clerks and a clerical officer. One of the District Court clerks went on a career break. In early October, a civil servant, who previously worked with the Department of the Environment in Ballina, was transferred to the District Court office there. She was replacing the court clerk who went on a career break.
District Court clerks are statutory officers who must be appointed to their posts and assigned to a particular district or office. It is a matter for the Minister for Justice to appoint and assign a District Court clerk, pursuant to the Court Officers Act, 1926. Section 46(2) of that Act states "Subject to the provisions of this section, every District Court clerk shall be appointed by the Minister and shall, (unless he is a pensionable officer) hold office at the will of and may be removed by the Minister".
It will not come as a surprise to anybody who has taken even a passing interest in the actions and omissions of the Minister for Justice that she did not bother to make the appointment. Political cynics and connoisseurs alike will agree that a Minister for Justice who allows the Special Criminal Court to be improperly constituted for several months will in all probability consider the failure to properly assign and appoint a District Court clerk a trivial matter. However, it is not a trivial matter; it is a most serious matter. One of the most important functions of a District Court clerk is the issuing of summonses which can ground all criminal proceedings from the most trivial to the most serious.
The unfortunate civil servant concerned, who thought she was a District Court clerk but was not, courtesy of the Minister for Justice, was signing and issuing summonses by 1 November 1996 but it is possible that she might have started doing so earlier. Once again the Minister for Justice failed to spot her own error and inquiries had to be made in the Department of Justice on 5 December 1996, to ascertain whether the civil servant concerned had been properly appointed and assigned. It was surely no coincidence that on that very day, 5 December 1996, the appointment and assignment of the civil servant as District Court clerk to District Court Areas 2 and 3 was made.
The matter first came before the Court at Ballina, County Mayo, yesterday, 10 December 1996, when the District Justice suggested that he strike out all the summonses — which, because of the time limits involved, necessarily had to be issued before 5 December — and they could then be reissued. It was pointed out that some of them could be reissued because they are related either to indictable offences or there was still some time available within the six month period for the issue of the summonses to have them done properly. Other summonses, however, are now out of time and these would include drunken driving summonses.
The garda superintendent correctly insisted, that the matter be proved and, consequently, all cases where summonses were issued by the civil servant concerned were adjourned to Ballina District Court on 14 January 1997 and liberty was given to issue a witness summons against the principal officer of the Department of Justice directing his attendance at that court and to bring with him all documents relating to the appointment of the new District Court clerk.
In addition to the summonses before the District Court in Ballina, County Mayo yesterday, there may be others for future sittings of the court in Ballina and in at least ten other courts. It is possible a large number of summonses issued by the civil servant have yet to come to light. Nobody knows how many of them will be out of time and, therefore, will be incapable of being reissued. It is also impossible to say what else the civil servant may have done in the mistaken belief that she was a validly appointed and defined District Court clerk. It is clear that the extent to which any problems can be rectified depends on ascertaining very quickly what was done in the eight weeks before the appointment was made.
It appears the Minister for Justice has learned nothing from the Special Criminal Court fiasco. Her appalling bungling in this matter led to invalid summonses. This abysmal level of ineptitude would be bad enough in any other Department, but is wholly unacceptable in a Department as sensitive as the Department of Justice. Sadly, further blunders of this kind are inevitable for as long as the Minister, Deputy Owen, presides over this shambles.
Proceedings in the District Court in respect of an offence may be commenced by the appropriate officer of the District Court issuing a summons as a matter of administrative procedure. Summonses are issued under the general superintendence of the appropriate District Court clerk and the name of an appropriate District Court clerk appears on the summons.
A new executive officer was appointed to Ballina District Court office on 10 October 1996. It is standard practice when new staff, whose duties are likely to include acting as District Court clerk, are being appointed to District Court offices to formally appoint them to act in that capacity. Although this was not done in the case in question I understand that on the authorisation of the chief clerk in the District Court office in Ballina the signature of the executive officer appeared on the summonses.
Formal appointments to act as District Court clerk are made under section 46(2) of the Court Officers Act, 1926. Under the Ministers and Secretaries Acts the Minister for Justice authorises named departmental officials to authenticate the appointment. This is a long-standing practice. The appointment is effected by the issue of a document from the personnel division of the Department of Justice. The omission to issue the necessary document to the chief clerk in Ballina on this occasion was due to error on the part of an executive officer in the personnel division. Because of the routine nature of the processing of the document of appointment, including the document appointing an executive officer assigned to a court office as an appropriate District Court clerk, they are issued directly to the relevant court office by the personnel division and do not require submission to or signature by the Minister. This again is in accordance with long-standing practice.
The two officials concerned in this instance, the chief clerk in Ballina and an executive officer in the Department of Justice, have been asked to furnish an explanation as a matter of urgency for the lapse that occurred. In the meantime the advice of the Chief State Solicitor has been sought on the legal implications arising.
I understand a number of cases where summonses bore the signature of the newly-appointed executive officer in question came for hearing at Ballina District Court yesterday and were adjourned until 14 January 1997. I understand also that on legal advice the Garda authorities have decided to make fresh applications for summonses in respect of all cases where the issue of summonses is still within the time permitted by law.
A check of the relevant files in the Department of Justice has shown that on many occasions over the years — prior to the appointment of the present Minister for Justice — the formal document appointing officials to act as a District Court clerk frequently took place several years after the officers in question acted in that capacity. The document of appointment in these cases was backdated following advice received from the Attorney General's office in 1986.
My advice is that as the recent cases to which I referred are now sub judice it would not be appropriate at this point to comment on the possible legal aspects of the issues which have arisen.
The Dáil adjourned at 9.40 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Thursday, 12 December 1996.