The purpose of the Bill is to extend to members of the Judiciary and to specific court officers, namely, the Master of the High Court, taxing masters and county registrars, certain pension benefits which are already available to most other groups in the public service. The Bill, which is broadly similar to one which was introduced in 1984 but which lapsed with the dissolution of the 24th Dáil, would honour a commitment made by the Taoiseach of the day, Deputy Garret FitzGerald, to a member of the Judiciary who vacated office for the purpose of taking up a position with the European Communities. The commitment has since led to threats of legal action if not put in place.
I propose to take each proposal in turn as it occurs in the Bill, set out the background and explain, as clearly as I can, its implications. The first proposal appears in section 2. The purpose of this section is to enable temporary service to reckon for pension purposes. Temporary Circuit Court judges may be appointed under section 14 of the Courts of Justice Act, 1936 and temporary District Court justices may be appointed under section 51 of the same Act. As the House will be aware, the need for temporary judges and justices has arisen frequently over the years to meet unusual increases in the work and commitments of the Circuit and District Courts. The section provides that a judge of the Supreme, High or Circuit Courts who has served as a temporary Circuit Court judge may have this service reckoned for pension purposes. Similarly, a justice in the District Court who has service as a temporary justice may have such service reckoned for pension purposes.
The principle of allowing temporary full-time service to count for pension purposes was conceded in the Civil Service as far back as 1967. It was applied to other public sector groups in the 1970s. I am satisfied that extension of the concession to members of the Judiciary is timely.
The next proposal is in section 3 which would allow part of a year, rather than, as at present, full years only, count for pension purposes. The principle of reckoning part years for pension purposes was one of a number conceded in the Civil Service under the conciliation and arbitration scheme in 1975. Again, I suggest that extension of the principle to the Judiciary and court officers is not unreasonable.
I should like to emphasise that failure to reckon temporary service and part-years can result in serious short-changing. I should like to give one example, which is neither hypothetical nor unusual. A member of the Judiciary retired with total service of 13 years and 362 days. Temporary service which accounted for 115 days did not reckon for pension purposes and neither did the balance of 247 days because of the fact that full years only could be counted. This meant that pensionable service was taken as 13 years only. If temporary service and the other "odd" days had been allowed to reckon, the value of his pension would have been 7 per cent higher. I suggest that it is quite inequitable to deprive any pensioner of such an amount on what can only be described as a technicality.
Section 4 proposes to give power to the Minister for Finance to make regulations setting up a formal spouses' and children's pension scheme on the lines of the informal, voluntary scheme which has been operating on an adminstrative basis since 1969. The scheme would be similar to that operating already for other public service groups. It is a contributory scheme, the level of contributions having been established on an actuarial basis to make it self-financing. Basically, the scheme provides that in the event of death in office of a contributor a pension becomes payable to the deceased's spouse and children based on the number of years service the deceased would have given had he survived to normal retirement age. It also provides for payment of a pension on the death, subsequent to retirement, of a person who was a contributing member while in office. A deduction is made from the lump sum of appropriate contributions for any notional years' service and for any years for which no contribution had been made during temporary service, for example. For all persons appointed to office subsequent to the making of the regulations membership will be compulsory. Nothing out of the ordinary is proposed in this scheme and I am sure the House will see the merits of formalising it.
I come now to sections 5 and 6 which propose that the Minister for Finance may make regulations providing for preserved pension benefits for members of the Judiciary and certain court officers. This proposal gave rise to an amount of controversy when the 1984 Bill was published. However, I am prepared to continue with this.
Determination of retirement age is dealt with in section 6. Normally benefits would be payable in no case earlier than at age 65. In the case of Supreme and High Court judges the age could be anywhere between 65 and 72 and in the case of Circuit Court judges between 65 and 70. The only exceptions would, as I have said, be in the case of death or permanent disability.
Before leaving sections 5 and 6, I should draw attention to the proposal under which the Minister for Finance may make regulations to provide for the purchase, at full actuarial cost, of notional years' service for pension purposes. This proposal would enable persons who would qualify for a pension in the normal course, but who would not have the potential for enough service for a full pension by normal retiring age, to buy additional years of notional service to enhance their pension. Purchase would be at full actuarial cost so that, overall, the proposal would not be an additional cost to the Exchequer. The usual means of purchasing notional years is by periodic contributions from salary or by reduction from the retirement lump sum payment.
Section 7 provides for the laying of regulations, when made under sections 4 and 5 of this Act, before the Houses of the Oireachtas. Subsection (1) is confined to "judicial" regulations and in accordance with normal practice, does not provide for power of annulment. The provisions at subsection (2), which will apply to "court officer" regulations, are the usual ones requiring that regulations be laid before each House of the Oireachtas for 21 sitting days during which they can be annulled by a resolution of either House.
Sections 8 and 9 would have the effect of abolishing the requirement for a minimum of five years' service to qualify for a death gratuity and so bring this group of people into line with the rest of the public service. At present, judges and justices must, under section 2 of the Courts of Justice and Court Officers (Superannuation) Act, 1961, have served for at least five years before a death gratuity becomes payable. The same rules applies to court officers under section 4 of the same Act. By abolishing the minimum service requirement this section would contribute towards the alleviation of distress in the vent of the untimely death of a judge, justice or court officer. The amount payable as death gratuity would, of course, continue to be equal to the yearly amount of the salary of the judge, justice or court officer at the time of his death.
Section 10 provides for retrospection for various provisions in the Bill. The dates chosen are related broadly to the dates on which similar changes were made for other public sector groups.
These, then, are the changes to pension arrangements proposed in this Bill. They are quite limited in extent and are in line with arrangements already in force for most other groups in the public sector. There are no changes in the broader provisions for pensions for the Judiciary and the specific court officers which are contained in the Courts (Supplemental Provisions) Act, 1961 and the Courts of Justice and Court Officers (Superannuation) Act, 1961. Judges of the Supreme, High and Circuit Courts qualify for full pension after 15 years' service. The pension amounts to a maximum of two-thirds of remuneration. However, pension is reduced to one-half remuneration for the purpose of providing for payment of a gratuity on retirement. District justices and court officers qualify for full pension after 20 years' service and the manner of calculating maximum pension, with and without a retirement gratuity, is otherwise the same as that for judges. As I have said, no change is proposed in relation to these entitlements.
I regard the limited measures proposed in this Bill as fair and reasonable and, accordingly, I commend the Bill to the House.