Our policy on accessibility
Our aim is to provide top class facilities for all users of the courts, including judges, staff, legal practitioners, victims, witnesses, accused persons, media and members of the public.
Providing facilities for all court users
Everyone who attends courts presents with a different set of circumstances, a varying degree of understanding and a personalised set of needs. We recognise that access does not stop at the level of physical access to, and within buildings. We are conscious that access to information, the understanding of court processes and inclusion in court proceedings needs to be provided in an atmosphere of equality.
Measures we have taken to improve access to the courts:
- Members of the public and those with cases before the court can adapt hearing aids to make use of induction loops which form part of our public address system in the courtrooms of refurbished buildings
- All refurbished courthouses have signage and directions at doorways and entrances and exits
- Signage and contact details for court offices are in Braille
- Wheelchair ramps are provided in many courthouses
- Wheelchair users can give evidence in many courthouses at the front of the court beside the witness box
If you have any queries, you can contact the Access Officer by email at accessofficer@courts.ie.
Access to records of court hearings
Court records are under the control of the judge before whom the proceedings are heard. Any request for access to a record of a court hearing must be made to the judge by application, in the proceedings concerned in accordance with the relevant rules of court. It is a matter for that judge to decide whether access is to be made available and in what format. The applicant will generally be required to pay the full economic cost of obtaining and providing any records to which access is given.
The rules of court governing the procedure to be followed when seeking access to the record of court proceedings and the terms on which access may be allowed are prescribed in the following statutory instruments:
• S.I. No. 99 of 2013 – District Court (Recording of Proceedings) Rules 2013
• S.I. No. 100 of 2013 – Circuit Court (Recording of Proceedings) Rules 2012
• S.I. No. 101 of 2013 – Rules of the Superior Courts (Order 123) 2013.
Our website
The Courts Service is committed to making our website accessible in accordance with S.I. 258/2020.
We are committed to achieving AA standard under WCAG 2.1 guidelines.
Status
PDFs: Many documents are published as PDFs – which are less accessible than HTML pages for people using assistive technologies. Some of the issues with PDFs include:
- the fact that they are not bookmarked ( WCAG guideline 2.4.5 )
- tables in PDFs are not defined ( WCAG guideline 1.3.1 )
Judgments and Determinations are published as PDFs on this website as this format is acceptable for presentation to, and use in court, as well as for inclusion in papers filed in cases before the courts. A format where page numbers and the position of paragraphs on pages remain fixed is of assistance, so that references by parties in the courtroom remain consistent. To aid accessibility, judgments are also published in Word format where they have been supplied for publication.
This is not an exhaustive list of non-accessible content.
Exempted content
PDF documents that were published before 23 September 2018 are exempt from these guidelines except where it is related to a service that a member of the public has to use.
Videos or audio published before 23 September 2020 are exempt from these guidelines
In some sections of our website, the text used may be more legalistic, because of the nature of the content (for example, court rules, references to legislation and court judgments).
If you have any queries or comments on accessibility of this website, please contact the webmaster at webmaster@courts.ie.
Our publications
We aim to present our leaflets and booklets in plain language, in a variety of languages and in a variety of formats. All our publications are published to our website in PDF. Many are also published in HTML.
If you experience any difficulty in the accessibility or general usability of our site (whether related to disability or not), or have general suggestions for improving the site design then we would greatly appreciate hearing from you. Please e-mail your comments and suggestions to: sitecomments@courts.ie