Mrs Justice Catherine McGuinness is to become president of the Law Reform Commission when Mr Justice Declan Budd completes his five-year term next Monday, The Irish Times has learned.
However, she is expected to finish out the law term that ends with the Easter vacation, and take up her position after Easter.
Mrs Justice McGuinness, a Supreme Court judge, is due to retire from the bench next year, but the presidency of the Law Reform Commission is for a five-year term, so she will work on beyond retirement as a judge.
She is one of the best-known members of the judiciary, as she has held a number of high-profile positions outside the bench. She was chairwoman of the Forum for Peace and Reconciliation until 1997 and chairwoman and sole member of the inquiry into the Kilkenny incest case, which ended by calling for an amendment to the Constitution to specifically protect the rights of the child.
She is best known in legal circles for her judgments in family law matters, where she has developed the law relating to marriage, the family and children. In a number of judgments she outlined the contribution made by a woman working full-time in the home to a marriage, and put a monetary value on this contribution.
She and Mr Justice Nial Fennelly were a minority in the Supreme Court's L and O judgment, where the majority stated that the foreign parents of Irish-born children did not have the right to live in Ireland. She stressed the importance of the rights of the family under the Constitution in her dissenting judgment.
While Mrs Justice McGuinness will be able to continue on the Supreme Court bench and hear occasional cases, her appointment as president of the Law Reform Commission will create a vacancy on the Supreme Court.
Two other prominent judicial positions are becoming vacant in the near future, as Mr Justice Esmond Smyth's seven-year term as president of the Circuit Court comes to an end, and Mr Peter Smithwick, president of the District Court, is expected to be appointed to head the promised inquiry into the murder of two RUC officers by the IRA on their way back from a visit to the Republic.
The inquiry was announced by the Minister for Justice last year following the publication of the report on controversial killings in Northern Ireland by the retired Canadian Supreme Court judge, Mr Peter Cory. In his report Judge Cory said that intelligence reports, if accepted, indicated collusion by employees of this State in the killings.
Mr Justice Smyth is the first president appointed under new terms for leading judicial appointments setting a seven-year time limit. He can return to being an ordinary judge of the Circuit Court. However, a vacancy will be created on the High Court if one of its members is appointed to the Supreme Court to replace Mrs Justice McGuinness.
Mr Justice Budd will return to the High Court.