Parliamentary secretary welcomes court procedures bill

Parliamentary Secretary Edwin Vassallo has welcomed a Bill to amend the Code of Organisation and Civil Procedure, saying it was an important step towards greater efficiency and effectiveness in the court.

The main object of the Bill is to consider a judicial act as an executive title in uncontested claims for the recovery of a debt. It also makes other provisions to expedite procedures - such as mandatory arbitration before the Arbitration Centre in traffic cases of a value of up to Lm5,000, which are currently mostly heard before the Small Claims Tribunal.

Mr Vassallo said he could not understand how the opposition, which once boasted of putting "the citizen first" could accuse the government of arrogance for taking steps for the people to be better serviced by the courts.

It was unacceptable that nearly half of court cases had been pending for over five years. Such a situation created hardship for small businesses owed money. Indeed, many people went to court simply to buy time and delay payment. His appeal to ministers, Mr Vassallo said, was to come up with more such legislation which cut bureaucracy, removed ancient procedures and increased efficiency. His concern was that some people were opposing such laws because their job depended on antiquated procedures.

The fast track procedures being introduced in this bill would be useful for the recovery of uncontested debts. He augured that procedures would also be speeded up in the case of contested claims, so that the courts would not be used as a "refuge" by those who did not want, or could not, pay up.

Labour MP Justyne Caruana said the government had the duty to face the problem of inefficiency and delays in court. However, certain amendments proposed in this bill were dangerous and could be counter-productive as they could create consequential cases which would introduce further delays.

In terms of this bill, she noted a creditor could file an official letter served on the debtor claiming up to Lm5,000 and if the claim was not contested within 30 days the official letter would have the same effect as a judgement. But what would happen if the debtor did not personally receive the letter and the deadline expired?

Clearly, the bill needed to specify how notification was to be made. She felt a court official should deliver the letter personally to the debtor.

Furthermore, at present, the creditor did not have a requirement to make a sworn statement to confirm his claim.

Neither was the bill clear on how the debtor could contest the claim made by the creditor. And when the debtor contested the claim by the creditor, whose was to be the final say?

Turning to mandatory arbitration, Dr Caruana complained that since there was no Arbitration Centre in Gozo and no qualified arbiters, it appeared that Gozitans would have to travel to Malta for arbitration cases.

Labour MP Joe Brincat said that the bill was a sieve full of holes. It would actually lengthen procedure even though its intention was the opposite. It would also raise costs.

Despite the provisions of this bill, when one wanted to lengthen procedures, all he had to do was object to the creditor's claim on the 30th day after receiving the official letter. Once an objection was made, the case would still have to go to court and the judicial proceedings would take their own time. The only thing one had to do to win time was to oppose on the last day.

Dr Brincat gave examples from current procedures to underline the point that the bill needed to be clear and specific on how notification of the official letter was to be made. The format of the official letter should also be established, to avoid problems.

Dr Brincat asked what was to become of businessmen who were in debt with a bank and received an official letter for Lm5,000.

If the government wanted to protect debtors, it should introduce a system where those who did not use the courts did not pay for them.