Report’s 16 measures to improve justice data
A report published by the Law Society’s Centre for Justice and Law Reform makes 16 recommendations aimed at improving data collection and reporting in the Irish justice system.
The inaugural Justice Indicators report draws on more than 100 national and international data sources to provide an assessment of the performance of core elements of Ireland’s justice system compared with other jurisdictions.
The research uses a traffic-light system – green, amber, and red lights – to evaluate key areas of the system; some areas are allocated a white light, however, where the data is deemed insufficient to make an informed assessment.
Civil settlements
On the courts, the report urges the Courts Service to record and publish the average length of court proceedings (disposition times) for all courts and for all types of case.
It adds that the courts body should share data with the Council of Europe to enable the calculation of estimated disposition times for comparative purposes.
The report also recommends that the Courts Service report the number of civil cases settled each year to enable a more accurate assessment of case-clearance rates, which compare the number of cases settled with the number of new cases.
The research also calls on the courts body to:
- Disaggregate administrative cases from civil cases in its reporting,
- Record and publish the extent of the case backlog at each court level on an annual basis,
- Record and publish the ‘age’ of the backlogged case load in the Irish courts each year, and
- Include a breakdown of the number of judges in each court in its annual reports.
Sitting days
The Law Society’s centre also calls on the Courts Service to publish the number of sitting days of each court, to enable a more accurate calculation of judges’ caseloads.
It adds that the Council of Europe should expand the scope of CEPEJ (European Commission for the Efficiency of Justice) evaluation reports to include caseloads per judge and enable comparison across member states.
The report also recommends that the Courts Service follow the Council of Europe (CEPEJ) reporting guidelines and include judicial salaries when reporting the annual public budget allocated to the functioning of the courts.
Crime statistics
On crime-detection rates, the centre says that the gardaí should separately report detection rates for historical crime incidents and contemporary crime incidents, while the Central Statistics Office should publish separate rates for both categories.
The report calls on the EU statistics agency Eurostat to ensure that its own definition of ‘police officers’ is consistently applied when publishing policing figures for EU member states, while it also urges An Garda Síochána to record and publish the number of resignations and retirements from, and appointments to, the service each year.
Other recommendations include an expansion of the scope of the Council of Europe’s SPACE reports on states’ penal systems to include indicators on public trust in prison systems.
The centre also urges the Department of Justice, in collaboration with the Irish Prison Service, to introduce mechanisms to measure public and stakeholder confidence in the effectiveness of the prison system.