INTERVIEW: After 10 years at the helm, PJ Fitzpatrick is about to leave the Courts Service
THE COURTS Service was set up in 1999 with a new type of structure and mandate. Its board, chaired by the Chief Justice, has a majority of judges, thereby ensuring the independence of the organisation from Government and fulfilling that constitutional imperative. This majority has never been exerted, but is nonetheless important.
In the nine years since it was set up, the Courts Service has transformed the courts system. This is most obvious in the network of new and refurbished courthouses around the State, of which the latest is the massive new criminal court complex close to completion at Infirmary Road, Dublin.
It also has an award-winning website, providing information and allowing a number of legal transactions online - a major contrast with the situation in 1999 when there was not a single PC in any Circuit Court office.
Less obvious, but nonetheless real, is the changed experience of court users. Delays have been reduced; users' groups in areas such as family law, the children's court, probate and the examiner's office have an input into how these courts are organised; information on what happens in court is readily available.
The change was so total that in 2004, then minister for justice Michael McDowell described the Courts Service as "the jewel in the crown of public administration"; his successor, Brian Lenihan, said: "This type of reform and innovation is an example of what the Government is encouraging across the entire public service."
The Courts Service is increasingly seen as a model internationally for the administration of the courts, with Scotland and Northern Ireland preparing to establish similar structures.
So how was it done? PJ Fitzpatrick, outgoing chief executive of the Courts Service, spreads the credit very widely, starting with the Denham committee report which designed the new body after three years of intensive study and debate. He also praises the support for the new body from the judiciary, successive chief justices and ministers and representatives of the legal profession. Above all, he stresses the input of the staff.
"They faced changes that were unprecedented for them," he says. "A lot of them were already in the courts and had never carried out management functions before. We had extensive discussions with the unions; we had to get their agreement on the transfer of people between the jurisdictions, and on ending promotion by seniority."
Much of what was done involved changing the culture in this part of the public service. "It was a very traditional, hierarchical culture. What we had to do was create a much more inclusive, participative and empowering culture, allowing people to use their initiative and give people a bit of authority and freedom."
This involved loosening the traditional public service attachment to grade demarcation. "There was huge flexibility between grades, and we tried to create teamwork. We put in place robust audit, accountability and line-management arrangements. There was already great integrity, fairness and impartiality in the courts. These are values you can't buy."
As well as changing methods of work throughout the courts, Mr Fitzpatrick introduced outsourcing of some functions.
"This was not done for ideological reasons," he stresses. "Because we came from such a low base and had so much to do - on IT, buildings, maintenance - we could not have done it without outsourcing. We had a window of opportunity with capital funding and we wanted to get as much done as we could."
Maintenance, software and system development, IT training, security and public relations were all outsourced.
"Our experience of outsourcing has been very good, but it does have to be very, very tightly managed with measurable performance indicators. Outsourcing enabled the staff to concentrate on our core business, which is getting the business through the courts."
At each step, the agreement of the unions was crucial, he says. "There is no point in asking unions to accept things if you don't demonstrate to them the reasons and benefits. I'm very proud of the fact that in 10 years of huge change, we never had industrial action."
As the public service generally faces into a more challenging future, the lessons from setting up the Courts Service could be useful.
Service followed years of research
BEFORE THE setting up of the Courts Service, the courts were managed by the Department of Justice. It presided over a fragmented system of different jurisdictions (district, circuit, high and supreme), each separate from the other in its management, personnel and promotional structures.
This was combined with a Circuit Court structure where each of the eight circuits was effectively autonomous.
The physical infrastructure of the courts was in a dire state, with crumbling and insanitary buildings, lacking the most basic facilities for court users, and a total absence of modern technology.
All records were kept manually while €700 million in court funds, held on behalf of wards of court, were administered through written ledgers.
The smallest detail had to be referred to the Department of Justice. A senior member of the judiciary once told The Irish Times that he had had to contact a junior official in the department to request money to buy a copy of the then recently published authoritative book on the law of torts by William Binchy and Bryan MacMahon, for the judges' library. It was refused.
Delays were endemic in the system, across all the different areas of the law. A new organisation was required to address all of these problems.
The Courts Service did not come about overnight. It was the result of three years of intensive examination of the problems of the courts system. It began in 1995 when a working group on a courts commission was set up under with Ms Justice Susan Denham as chair.
The group consisted of 15 members, including three lay people and three representatives of relevant Government departments.
The other nine were members of the judiciary and representatives of the legal professions. They consulted widely nationally and internationally, including with the courts of Britain, the US, Australia, Canada and various European courts. It produced six reports, recommending, among other things, the setting up of a courts service which would be established by statute and would manage a unified courts system.
The reports were considered and detailed. The fourth report, for instance, contained a person specification for the post of chief executive of the courts service, a job outline, a draft advertisement for the post and a proposed core management structure.
The Government accepted these reports and set about legislating for a courts service.
As a result the Courts Service Act 1998 was passed in April of that year, establishing an independent body to administer and maintain the courts and support the judiciary.
A transitional board was established, whose task was to prepare for the setting up of the service and appoint a chief executive. It appointed PJ Fitzpatrick and early in 1999, the Courts Service came into being.
According to the sixth (and final) report: "The modernisation of the management of the courts was envisaged as a two-track process. On the one hand was the institutional change, the introduction of the Courts Service.
"On the other hand was the development of modern management techniques, such as team work and partnership, and the growth of a new management ethos."
It was this task which the new chief executive had to implement.