I move:
That leave be granted to introduce a Bill entitled an Act to provide for the selection, appointment and promotion of members of the judiciary, to establish a judicial appointments board with responsibility for recommending to Government who should be nominated for appointment to judicial office, to give effect to the declaration of the European Network of Councils for the Judiciary on standards for the recruitment and appointment of members of the judiciary approved in Dublin on 9, 10 and 11 May 2012, and to provide for related matters.
The Bill will reform the judicial appointments process, which is currently conducted by the Judicial Appointments Advisory Board that was established in the mid-1990s. It is the common view of all parties in the House that this organisation needs to be modernised and updated and that the judicial appointments process needs to be reformed to remove the perception that political affiliation plays a major part in such appointments.
