Editorial | Broken air conditioners and justice

The government must explain why, after more than a decade, it cannot solve the problem of malfunctioning air-conditioning units in Jamaican courts, especially those at the heart of the judicial system, the Supreme Court, in downtown Kingston.

This failure not only makes staff and judicial officers miserable, but adds to or compounds the issues that militate against lifting Jamaica’s judicial system to world-class standards.

The issue of faulty AC units in the courts arose again last week, when staff at the Supreme Court complained that they were being made to work in “inhuman conditions”, in hot courtrooms and back offices.

They described the work environment as a “fiery furnace”, and one staff member asked: “How can they achieve a first-class system when the clerks, who are an integral part of the system, are not being treated fairly?”

Neither the lament nor question is new. Nor do they come only from the regular civil service clerks in the court system.

An example of the longevity of this problem is the October 2013 report by this newspaper of the “renewed disquiet among staff of the Supreme Court” over AC systems that did not work, which especially affected “staff assigned to the office of judicial secretaries”. The heat sapped energy, diminished concentration, and elevated health risks.

The judicial secretaries are important members of the court system. They may type letters, reports and maybe even judgments for justices. In other words, they undertake the kind of routine tasks that help judges – as secretaries and administrative assistants do in other environments – to more efficiently utilise their time, thus enhancing their efficiency.

But judges, too, feel the heat, although rarely go public with their concerns, as Justice Lloyd Hibbert did, from the bench, in November 2016.

“This is unbearable,” Justice Hibbert lamented one hot morning, when the air conditioner did not work in his courtroom.

He added: “It (broken air-conditioning systems) has been going on for a long time and nobody seems to be addressing it. This is what people expect us to work in.”

Several lawyers later chimed in with their own complaints about the work environment, as attorney Zara Lewis did last week.

BUCKETS OF SWEAT

Ms Lewis talked about the “buckets of sweat” that poured from lawyers during a June 6 session in a courtroom of the Commercial Division of the Supreme Court, where the air conditioner did not work.

Two years before Justice Hibbert’s intervention on the air-conditioning issue from the bench, he had also complained about the general working conditions for judges, and the slow pace in completing 12 new chambers for justices in a then newly acquired wing of the court which was being retrofitted. The heat and lack of space, Justice Hibbert disclosed, drove and some justices to seek cool and calm working spaces in vehicles –presumably in judges’ private parking areas.

This complaint about an unbearably hot working environment by judges, lawyers and court staff is no mere whinge by a prissy and pampered professional elite.

The heat is real, and, in the face of global warming and climate change, is likely to get worse. While countries must work as hard as possible to reverse, slow or mitigate that crisis, people in charge are obligated to, as far as possible, make work environments comfortable for their staff.

Indeed, July 21 broke the record for Earth’s hottest day ever, at an average 17 degrees Celsius, beating the 17.08 degrees reached on July 6, 2023. But only a day later, the new record was broken, with a temperature of 17.15 degrees Celsius. The following day, though not as hot as the previous, was the third-hottest on record.

The records are expected to continue to be broken.

Recall that this record is the average for the planet. Some places have significantly, and sustained, higher temperatures than the global average, that, apart from the long-term risks, pose immediate challenges.

AT RISK

Indeed, the International Labour Organization warned in a recent report that seven in 10 of the world’s labour force – 2.4 billion people – are at risk from extreme heat.

Notably, the Americas, of which Jamaica is a part, has the fastest increase in heat-related occupational injuries.

Further, experts have pointed out that when daily temperatures rise upwards of 34 degrees Celsius (93.2 degree Fahrenheit), labour productivity declines. The potential impact of this on domestic and global economies is apparent.

This enervating effect of an extremely hot workplace, exacerbated faulty air conditioning system, impacts courthouses no less than other workplaces.

As the United Nations secretary general, António Guterres, said in the aftermath of the latest heat record: “We need measures to protect workers, grounded in human rights. And we must ensure that laws and regulations reflect the reality of extreme heat today — and are enforced.”

Including people who work in the courts.