Law & Disorder: Poor Box used in lieu of penalty points

There has been no provision in law since 2010 for a judge to allow a guilty defendant to escape penalty points and a conviction for a penalty points offence (such as speeding, holding a mobile phone while driving, no insurance, careless driving, dangerous driving and dozens of others).

In 2014 the High Court ruled that "the District Court enjoys no jurisdiction to impose an informal sanction such as accepting a donation to the poor box, as this would amount to an indirect circumvention" of the law. Yet we observed the practice continuing with some judges.

Figures provided to Tommy Broughan T.D., in response to a parliamentary question, show that District Court judges used the poor box for 843 penalty point offences in 2015, 260 in 2016 and 223 in the first nine months of this year.