People are being better served by the courts - Mifsud Bonnici

The government will introduce important legislation next year to continue the reform of the administration of justice, Parliamentary Secretary Carmelo Mifsud Bonnici said in Parliament yesterday.

He said there would be further amendments to the Criminal Code and the Code of Organisation and Civil Procedure as well as laws on the execution of warrants and a law for the creation of an Administrative Tribunal.

He said the reform process so far had already yielded faster dispute resolution and a reduced backlog at the courts.

Dr Mifsud Bonnici said the reforms introduced in the past in the face of strong opposition were now bearing fruit. For example, in the Family Court the mediation services were increasingly succeeding in reconciling couples who filed for separation.

And where mediation failed, the number of amicable settlements was also rising and less cases, some 40 per cent less, ended up before the courts.

Another successful change last year was the introduction of the executive letter to replace court cases for the payment of bills of exchange and undisputed debt.

Whereas 374 official letters were filed last year for the payment of bills of exchange, their number this year had already reached 535, he explained.

And since August, 905 official letters were filed for the recovery of debts up to Lm5,000. These official letters became executive warrants once the claims were not disputed within 30 days. Objections were only made in 52 cases. This mechanism had reduced the number of new court cases and resulted in substantial savings of cost and time to the parties involved.

Dr Mifsud Bonnici said that since August, all property cases were now being heard before the First Hall, also saving considerable time.

The government, through legislation, last year transferred more cases, notably traffic cases, to arbitration, which means that they were settled far more quickly now. And the number of cases of voluntary arbitration cases had risen to 17. The Arbitration Centre had netted Lm3,060 from the traffic cases and Lm3,150 from voluntary arbitration.

It was not true that the European Commission was against mediation. The commission had also issued a Green Paper on the matter.

The Mediation Centre was drawing up a code of ethics and a list of mediators.

The most important result of the list of changes which the government had introduced in the courts was that in most cases, the people now knew when proceedings would be completed. Some 30 per cent of cases were now settled within three months. And the situation would improve further.

The opposition was claiming that the number of court cases was declining. But one had to keep in mind that some 1,400 official letters had been filed for the recovery of debts or the payment of bills of exchange, all replacing full court cases. And more cases were being heard by the tribunals instead of the courts. When one considered everything, one would see that more people had actually sought the courts and the other dispute resolution mechanisms. Confidence had increased and attitudes were changing. For example, people were now opting to settle their debts more quickly. This was especially beneficial to SMEs who suffered poor cashflow when clients did not pay on time.

At the magistrates' courts the backlog of cases had been reduced from 1,767 last year to 1,500 so far this year, and the number of decided cases had increased from 560 in all of last year to 627 so far this year.

In the first hall of the civil court the number of pending cases had dropped from 6,157 to 4,991, a decline of 20 per cent.

Whereas last year 67 per cent of court cases were over three years old, now that percentage was 58 per cent.

In the criminal courts sector, Dr Mifsud Bonnici said changes were planned for next year. Compilations were taking too long to be completed and the backlog of cases had risen by seven per cent. There were also 1,140 proces verbals, a number which was too high. Payments for court experts were also rising and a remedy was called for.

What the government would do was to introduce faster procedures for compilation of evidence, reduce the need for proces verbals and better control spending on court experts.

Dr Mifsud Bonnici said the process for the merging of the Public Registry and the Land Registry was continuing, the aim being to have greater certainty in titles and faster access to the registry.

At the Passports Office, a record 21,000 documents were issued over the past year and the challenge ahead was now the introduction of biometric passports.

Anglu Farrugia, opposition spokesman on justice, earlier in the debate insisted that the tariffs as revised by the government had made justice unaffordable.

Between January and December 2003 there had been 1,775 new civil cases in the First Hall, 655 in the Magistrates' Courts, including Gozo, and 2,695 in the Small Claims Tribunal. After Malta's accession to the EU, with the presupposed greater accessibility to the courts, the number of new cases in the First Hall had come down to 1,384 in the First Hall, 471 in the Magistrates' Courts and 2,509 in the Small Claims Tribunal. The corresponding figures for 2005 to date were 1,180, 337 and 1,850.

This showed that the number of new cases was dwindling from year to year.

Dr Farrugia said he felt that any review of the tariffs should involve retired judges, the Chief Justice and well-versed members of the public. The tariffs should not be viewed as a revenue-raising tax because the courts were a service and an essential element of democracy. They should certainly not be used as a deterrent to seek justice.

Wives who were not getting alimony from their estranged husbands could not possibly pay four-figure sums in payment for court-ordered evaluations of the husband's assets. The situation was untenable.

On debt-collection, Dr Farrugia said it was not a remedy to view a judicial letter as the conclusion of a case involving less than Lm5,000.

The government criticised Opposition Leader Alfred Sant for seeking ways around EU rules when in actual fact it was the government which was doing much the same itself. Mediation was a case in point. The government had amended the law to the effect that anyone refusing mediation could see the court doubling their costs in favour of the other party. Yet it was not always feasible to get several litigants in an inheritance case, for example, to submit to mediation. This amendment went against the dispositions of the EU and the government knew this, he emphesised.

Dr Farrugia said he was looking forward to seeing the list of people who could be nominated as court experts, which the government said it would issue. One would have to see if it was constituted of blue-eyed boys.

The European Commssion, he said, did not see mediation as an adequate alternative to court hearings. This meant that whoever refused mediation should have a proper right to a court hearing and sentence.

In the Family Court one could only wish that marital problems would be solved through mediation, but it could not be said that the system was working well. The success rate had not gone beyond 11 per cent. The procedure should be reviewed, he insisted Mr Justice Ray Pace would soon be leaving the bench. There needed to be at least four judges, and current judges were already heavily loaded.

In the Family Court the system of video testimony had still not been installed.

Dr Farrugia insisted that the courts needed to have adequate staff if they were to be efficient. Staff shortages were undermining the standing of the courts that wanted to decide on cases as soon as possible.

It was indicative that almost nobody wanted to work at the courts. Working conditions also left a lot to be desired. There should be a serious exercise to ensure that all workers sent there, have take part in regular upgrading exercises, without anybody seeming to be privileged. On the other hand, deployment of workers to the courts should make sense. What could an interior decorator, for example, manage to do in the courts during sittings? he asked.

The Labour MP said he asked something also had to be done to relieve the public of excessive waiting in cases where the judge was assigned international commitments.

He said the Small Claims Tribunal's competence had been repeatedly raised without anything being done to increase the tribunal's staff. It was telling that the new budget was not setting aside any increased vote for an increased workload.

The time had long come to consider having judicants in the tribunals working full time.

Justice Minister Tonio Borg said the opposition's track record was to oppose everything that the government proposed, and its weaknesses were becoming increasingly apparent as the success of the reforms became more evident.

Dr Borg pointed out that while the last Labour government allocated just Lm1,700 for the law courts building, this government was allocating Lm250,000 as capital expenditure for next year.

And while the opposition was claiming that court tariffs had gone up, the tariffs which most ordinary people were charged had actually gone down.

Since 1998 the backlog of cases had declined by 29 per cent, and by 14 per cent since last year.