AN ACTION by 32 district court clerks challenging the Minister for Justice over their salary scales and status began in the High Court yesterday.
The district court clerks, who the Dublin Metropolitan District and County Borough of Cork, are taking the action against the Minister, Ireland the Attorney General.
Yesterday, Mr James O'Reilly SC, for the clerks, told Mr Justice Morris that his clients' complaint was that they were being assimilated into the general Civil Service without any reference to their status as court clerks.
The clerks claimed they were office holders, which was different from civil servants. They were at the level of higher executive officers and if the statute was complied with they would all be at the level of the higher grade of assistant principle officers.
The defence stated that the legislation provided for the office of district court clerk but did not provide for an independent office of that name.
In an affidavit, Mr William Sexton, on behalf of the other court clerks said they had the description and salary of a HEO in the general Civil Service.
There were some nine further district court clerks outside the Dublin Metropolitan District and County Borough of Cork who had a Civil Service description of assistant principle officer and therefore had a higher annual salary.
The grades of court clerk, ranging from A to D, were estimated on the number of cases they had per annum. Grade A carried in excess of 15,000 cases, grade B was between 5,350 and 15,000.
Due to a "realignment agreement" negotiated by staff and Department of Justice in 1979, a grade B clerk then held the position of HEO in the Civil Service. The powers, duties and functions of the clerks were vested in them by the Court Officers Act 1926.
In 1981, when he queried the nature of his appointment to a new clerkship in Buncrana, Co Donegal, the Department said in a letter it considered the district court clerk was an HEO within the Civil Service structure rather than a statutory office holder appointed pursuant to the 1926 Act.
Mr Sexton said with regard to the case count criterion, not only was he advised that this lacked statutory sanction but that such a criterion was inherently arbitrary and unsatisfactory.
There was no grade A clerkship before 1979. Since then the 32 clerks, including himself, said to have the status of HEOs within the general Civil Service, had suffered financial loss annually, which was based on the difference in salary and increments which they earned as HEOs compared to the salary and increments they would gain as assistant principle officers.
The defence states that the legislation did not entitle them to the same salary scale and emoluments as the other provincial district court clerks. The case count system had been in place since 1973 and the applicants were guilty of inordinate delay in bringing the case to challenge it.
It was denied that the difference in remuneration currently operated by the Minister was outside her powers. It was also denied that the distinction in remuneration was arbitrary, haphazard, unreasonable in law and had no recreational or logical basis.