GOVERNMENT Senator Kamina Johnson Smith on Friday expressed frustration that procurement delays are impeding the Administration’s ability to further improve dilapidated courthouses across the country.

At the same time, she highlighted a raft of infrastructure upgrades completed and under way in keeping with the Government’s push to deliver better services and facilities in the justice system.

Johnson Smith was responding to criticisms levelled at the Government by Opposition Senator Lambert Brown about the deplorable state of the courts during this week’s sitting of the Senate.

She said that more than $400 million allocated by the Administration to effect repairs is tied up due to the tedious public sector procurement process that has been the source of frustration among Government and Opposition legislators.

“It cannot be that Senator Brown is going to complain about the urinals and the bathrooms in a courthouse when there is $430 million unspent allocated to the renovation of justice centres and for people to simply be told that it’s a procurement process that is too long. It is something that really needs attention, and it is one that I hope it will receive in the shortest order,” she said.

Johnson Smith said that it is clear that at every level of Government the system has over-corrected itself and procurement now has become “a bar to necessarily achieving the most effective, best value for money, and the most efficient provision of service delivery to the people of Jamaica”.

“There needs to be a review of procurement processes at every level in order for us to be able to do what people need,” she stressed.

Senator Brown’s remarks stemmed from his contribution to the debate on the Judicature (Rules of Court) Amendment Act which Johnson Smith piloted.

He argued that the Bill, which is intended to add the director of public prosecutions (DPP) to the membership of the Rules Committee of the Supreme Court, to enable the chief prosecutor to participate in the preparation of the rules of court applicable to both the Supreme Court and the Court of Appeal, “means that potentially more cases are likely to go to the courts”.

“What strikes us on this side is the state of the courts in which these rules are going to be [applied]… And so we are putting in this new wine, so to speak, in old wineskin and, as we put in this new wine, I hope that we can pay some attention to bring the worst cases in the courts’ physical condition up to some level of decency, like getting bathrooms fixed, urinals, toilets, dealing with the flooding as we see in Spanish Town this week,” he said.

“So I hope that we’re just not adding to the Rules Committee, but we’re going to pay attention to the physical conditions in which those who the rules of the court must guide have to operate,” he said.

Stating that he has seen first-hand the “terrible condition” that judges, prosecutors, defendants and all users of the courts have to face, Brown pointed to his experience at Spanish Town Circuit Court where, he said, “You could see palpable deterioration in the state of the courthouse — the chairs rotting, over-crowding.”

“The reality is that our court system is outdated, it’s not people-friendly. In many ways it’s archaic, issues like record-keeping,” he said.

Johnson Smith admitted that the justice sector “has been a victim of massive under-investment and lack of investment for decades, and has therefore suffered serious deterioration”.

She noted, however, that while the Government acknowledges that more needs to be done, the Administration has undertaken several initiatives to improve the service and facilities.

She pointed to partnerships with the European Union, which were part of the Administration’s programme to expand the Court of Appeal in 2018.

“We opened three new courtrooms, 13 judges’ chambers, two lounges, an expanded registry, among other upgraded and modern facilities for the Court of Appeal,” she said.

“We have not only created a new Family Court in Chapelton, a new one in Trelawny, a new one in St Ann opened just last month. This is a modern two-storey building in St Ann where there is privacy provided for the sensitive matters that are handled in a Family Court situation, provisions that are in compliance with the Disabilities Act. [There is] a justice centre beside it for the softer side — the more restorative side of justice — and this is part of the new justice complex that is going to be built, because there’s a new justice complex that’s also to be built in Manchester [and] another one will be part of St Thomas,” Johnson Smith said.

“There’s a new courthouse being constructed as part of the new Morant Bay Town Centre; it is under way, blocks going up as we speak. There is also significant effort that has been made in respect of the Clarendon Parish Court itself. There’s the addition of technology to the courts,” she added.

She also noted that in many courts across the island, audiovisual equipment has been rolled out that allows for witness testimony from overseas, which the Ministry of Foreign Affairs facilitates. This, she said, helps the delivery of justice for people who have concerns in Jamaica and need to travel but want to proceed with their cases.

“We have ensured that improved equipment is provided for Hansard reporting, judicial reporting, and judges’ ability to be able to take notes and provide them more easily and readily,” Johnson Smith said.

She noted as well that the number of judges in the Court of Appeal has increased from seven to 13, the Supreme Court from 30 to 42, and the parish courts from 50 to 77.

“Another thing that we have done is we added 22 judicial clerks in 2018 to assist judges in the management of their work, and this is what has allowed us to get to a stage where clearance of backlog has improved by a hundred per cent, a hundred-plus per cent in different courts,” she said, arguing that one ought not to look at the justice system and not acknowledge the improvements that have taken place.

“Yes, there are bathrooms that need to be improved. Yes, there are air conditioners, some have been replaced [and] some have been fixed, but there are places that require more support, more assistance, and it is quite clear from the discourse in the public domain over the week that there does need to be a more efficient relationship between the Court Administration Services and the Ministry of Justice, and there also needs to be improvements to the procurement systems,” she said.

The poor state of courts was recently brought to public attention by disgruntled court staff, but during a discussion on Radio Jamaica’s current affairs evening show Beyond the Headlines, Justice Minister Delroy Chuck had intimated that the Court Administration Division (CAD) had dropped the ball where maintenance of buildings was concerned. Chuck also claimed during the discussion that he was unaware of the state of the widespread problems at the country’s courthouses.

However, Chief Justice Bryan Sykes, speaking at a Judiciary of Jamaica press briefing on Monday, said the impression created that the courts were well-maintained institutions and have gone into decline since the CAD came into existence and has responsibility for the maintenance of the courts “is simply inaccurate” as capital expenditure was — and still is — the responsibility of the Ministry of Justice.

On Tuesday, when Finance and the Public Service Minister Dr Nigel Clarke closed the debate on the supplementary estimates, he said work is under way to fund new courthouses.

“I want to say to the chief justice and to the minister of justice, any capital project that has gone through the necessary approval that is brought for the funding of new courthouses, this Government will fund,” Clarke said.

The finance minister said transaction advisers and architects have been engaged for the projects, and the business case is expected to be completed by the first quarter of the 2025-2026 fiscal year.