Four senior judicial appointments will be made shortly and all eyes are on the new Government. Will Fianna Fail and the Progressive Democrats put their own people in place, in keeping with long tradition, and balance some of the placements of the last administration? Or will they fall in with the more recent trend and rely on the recommendations of the Judicial Appointments Board? There is one long-standing vacancy on the High Court, the president, Declan Costello, is taking early r etirement, and two extra judges are to be appointed to keep the legal process moving now that so many are chairing tribunals. The politically neutral advisory board screens candidates and makes recommendations to the Government. The Cabinet then decides, and while no advancement direct from the bar is possible without such a screening, the Government chooses from the nominees on its own criteria, which are almost always political. Indeed, sources maintained to Quidnunc this week that Fine Gael is much more ruthless in appointing its own people than Fianna Fail is.
The exceptions to the interview process are the appointments of the presidents of all courts and promotions from a lower court. So a government can bypass the board by moving its favourite judges up the hierarchy from the Circuit Court. Otherwise, the new judges will be chosen from barristers' applications to the advertisements.
High Court judges Fred Morris, Richard Johnson and Feargus Flood are favourites for president of the High Court. Supreme Court judges Susan Denham and Hugh O'Flaherty are both tipped to succeed Liam Hamilton as chief justice when he retires within two years. To appoint the first woman chief justice would appeal to both Bertie Ahern and Mary Harney, but O'Flaherty is closer to Fianna Fail. It is possible that one of them may accept the presidency of the High Court, the second most senior position, which has responsibility for allocating cases to judges and is therefore both powerful and influential.
The new administration has yet to show its colours on judicial influence and whether it will actively seek to have its own people in place to deal with thorny questions on the agenda. Like all internal matters in the Four Courts, developments are eagerly awaited.