Nature abhors a vacuum
This is a law of science true as any other law, like Newton’s laws of motion, which we are so accustomed to.
Owen Bonnici is the Minister for Justice, Culture and Local Government ature, scientists tell us, contains no vacuums because the denser surrounding material continuum would immediately fill the rarity of an incipient void.
This law is true in public administration as well.
Once you leave a door or window open, it is immediately filled in with other things – which sometimes are bad for you.
The Justice sector is unlike other sectors of governance. In more ways than one, in practice, it is as if there are two Ministers running concurrently the same sector, not one.
True, formally, there is one Justice Minister forming part of Cabinet and taking executive decision for the better administration of justice.
But given the supreme notion of separation of powers and the fact that the Judiciary is a separate organ of the state, distinct from the executive, it is as if there are two Justice Ministers running the show at the same time – the Minister and the Chief Justice.
In most decisions, the two must act together and in a spirit of compromise and mutual understanding. The difference is that while the first must face the electorate every five years, the second of course has security of tenure up till retirement age and does not have a superior whom to answer on a daily basis.
A Justice Minister is not unlike a football manager. Like the manager, there is a team of people who are tasked with doing a job which is all the time in the public eye. Like the manager, he has to answer for what the players do in the ground.
But with the difference that he cannot order the players in which position to play and he cannot substitute players. He cannot even talk to them about particular aspects of their job.
These are the necessary confines of the rule of law which we strictly abide by. These rules are necessary for a stronger democracy and history has consistently shown us that without those rules, society would end up worse off.
That is why we abide strongly by them, come what may, whatever the price.
A Justice Minister does not even have the automatic luxury to choose his co-pilot. Again, for the respect of the rule of law.
The notion of security of tenure means that in most cases a new Justice Minister has to work with a Chief Justice who was appointed by his predecessors.
For a whole legislature, I worked with a Chief Justice who was appointed by someone else from the opposing party.
The last time a Labour Government appointed a Chief Justice, I was a one year old.
Back in 1981, a Labour Government had appointed Dr Carmelo Schembri to the post and he had served up to the summer of 1987. And that was it.
After that, for a long stretch of 37 years, all Chief Justices were appointed by Nationalist Governments.
The notion of security of tenure, of course, guarantees, that a Judge is not influenced by anyone or anything in the functioning of his or her job.
But the possibility of choosing a candidate to fill a particular post gives you a one off opportunity to at least choose the person with the right commitment, frame of mind, values and energy.
For us, the upcoming Chief Justice must have a relentless determination to change things for the better in the Justice system.
That is the number one priority.
One of the most immediate challenges which our Justice system has is about how to communicate better and explain the hard work that is going on. Most Judges and Magistrates do put in long hours and work tirelessly in what is in effect a thankless job.
Unfortunately, most of the time, a vacuum of communication is left yawning and that is then filled by all kind of obnoxious messages which harm the system as a whole.
Sometimes I ask whether the Court administration should issue a statement on a particular case which is misreported. I get back 101 validly legal reasons why this should not be done (right to fair hearing etc). But then again, the vacuum is then filled by someone else and the justice system in the eye of the public ends up worse off.
This has to be addressed – and fast!
The good part of the story is that things are actually improving and strongly so.
I have just received the 2017 efficiency results in the civil sector. Again, it is an overtly positive result – the Clearance Rate remained at a stable 107%, meaning that for the fourth year running more cases were actually adjudicated than the amount that came in.
This led to the result that the backlog decreased yet again to 9458 cases, a full 17 per cent decrease compared to end 2012.
A marked improvement was also seen at Appellate stage where the Courts of Appeal have increased their energies to try and keep up with the increase in the number of judgments coming from the lower Courts.
I thank all the Judges sitting on the Appellate Courts for their extra effort.
Of course I am not saying that everything is rosy and I believe, for one, that there is room for improvement – particularly in the number of judgments given which in my mind should be of excess of 5,000 in the civil sector per year.
But we did all this together and we are proud of what we have achieved.