Courts (Supplemental Provisions) Act, 1961

Qualifications of justices of District Court and interpretation of section 2 of the Act of 1949, as applied by section 48 of this Act.

29.—(1) (a) Each of the persons who are justices of the existing District Court immediately before the operative date shall be qualified for appointment as a justice of the District Court and, if and so long as there is one or more than one of those persons who is willing to accept office and has not been appointed, no other person shall be qualified for appointment as a justice of the District Court.

(b) Paragraph (a) of this subsection applies only in relation to the qualification for appointment of the first justices of the District Court.

(c) Subsections (2) and (3) of this section shall have effect subject to the preceding paragraphs of this subsection.

(2) A person who is for the time being a practising barrister or solicitor of not less than ten years' standing shall be qualified for appointment as a justice of the District Court.

(3) A barrister or solicitor who actually practised his profession for not less than ten years shall be qualified for appointment as a justice of the District Court if for the time being he holds an office in respect of which it was (at the time of his appointment thereto) required by statute that every person appointed thereto should be or should have been—

(a) a practising solicitor, or

(b) a practising barrister or solicitor.

(4) Where a person (being, immediately before the operative date, a justice of the existing District Court by virtue of a warrant made under section 2 of the Act of 1949) is appointed a justice of the District Court, he shall, for the purposes of the Act of 1949, as applied by section 48 of this Act, be deemed to have been continued in office under the Act of 1949, as so applied, for a year commencing on the date on which he attained—

(a) if the warrant is the first in respect of him, sixty-five years or

(b) if the warrant is the second in respect of him, sixty-six years, or

(c) if the warrant is the third in respect of him, sixty-seven years, or

(d) if the warrant is the fourth in respect of him, sixty-eight years, or

(e) if the warrant is the fifth in respect of him, sixty-nine years.