High Court judge: Ireland needs an expansion of the bench

Mr Justice Richard Humphreys, addressing the 27th annual Parnell Summer School in Co Wicklow, said it was the “single biggest thing” the Oireachtas could do for Irish justice, The Irish Times reports.

The judge, opening the event, was speaking in a personal capacity.

He said Ireland is “rock bottom” in Europe for number of judges per head of the population, an “exceptionally weak position” that seemed to have passed “under the radar of public consciousness”.

Mr Justice Humphreys continued: “In my view the single biggest thing that the Oireachtas could do to improve the quality of justice in Ireland is to legislate to provide for additional judicial posts.”

Ireland presently has 163 judges, or 34 judges per million people. The per capita average across Europe is 700 per cent of the Irish figure.

The judge said: “One has to respectfully ask is Ireland living up to the requirement of having enough judges to allow all hearings to take place within a reasonable time? Unfortunately, I have to suggest not.”

He added: “The real losers from the lack of an adequate number of judges are parties to litigation, and in that regard the State is the biggest loser of all from inadequate numbers of judges.”

He also said he hoped his comments would be welcomed constructively and seen in the spirit of “a health dialogue”.