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WRITTEN QUESTION TO THE MINISTER FOR TREASURY AND RESOURCES BY DEPUTY T.M. PITMAN OF ST. HELIER
ANSWER TO BE TABLED ON TUESDAY 29th JANUARY 2013
Question
Are rooms in the Magistrate's Court building, Union Street, either rented, leased, hired, loaned or used by any private organisations? If so, what rooms, by whom, and for what consideration?
Answer
The Magistrate's Court Building' includes areas occupied by the Probation and After Care Service as well as the Courts themselves and ancillary offices.
No rooms are rented, leased or hired to any third party for a monetary consideration. Detailed below are the circumstances in which rooms may be permitted to be used by other organisations:-
- The Magistrate's Court will make available a Court for Law Firms for the following:
- Yearly - practical experience of Court processes for 6th Form students
- Practical experience of Court processes for newly qualified Advocates The above are normally a full day session.
- Ad-hoc lunchtime sessions covering issues such as Bail, Committals etc
- The Magistrate's Court makes provision for the following training:
- Witness Skills Training - run by Highlands College on behalf of the States of Jersey
- Police Witness Skills and Court Processes
- Prison Officers Court Processes
- JFSC Court Process training
The above are normally full day sessions.
- Centeniers training - normally a Saturday morning run by the Police Legal Advisers
- Interview rooms are used on an ad-hoc basis for a variety of reasons regarding the court - for example debt collection agencies for consultation with clients during Petty Debts Court sessions, Advocates interviewing clients prior to court appearances etc.
- The Victim Support and Witness Service, Centeniers and the Law Officers' Department are provided with a dedicated room and use of other rooms on an 'as required' basis - for example the training of new volunteers for the Victim and Witness Support service. This is provided rent free in recognition of the service provided to victims and witnesses
- The Magistrate's Court is part of the Court Service estate and is frequently used by the Royal Court and the Appeal Court.
- There are a number of informal visits to the Magistrate's Court from organisations such as the secondary schools/colleges, Scouts and Hackney Boys Club which, strictly speaking, also use rooms.
- The Magistrate's Court has an agreed protocol for the Police to use the Custody Suite as an emergency Police Station - this has been activated twice.
There is no charge levied on any of the above activities as they are viewed as being supportive of the overall aims of the Court.
- Probation provides an office space for the part time co-ordinator of the ADAPT programme for domestic violence perpetrators as part of the States and Court support for the charity. The co-ordinator is employed by a charity (the Hampton Trust) and in return no charge is made by the Trust for Probation Service referrals which are usually over 50% of those on the programme.
- Very occasionally Probation has allowed ad hoc use of an interview room for medical professionals preparing a report for the Courts when there is a security risk. No charge is levied by Probation.