New judges and call for magistrates a good step… but more action needed
New judges Doreen Clarke and Josette Demicoli took their oath of office at the Presidential Palace in Valletta on Wednesday.
In the meantime, the justice ministry has launched a call to appoint four new Magistrates – two to replace the aforementioned who have now become judges, and two additional magistrates.
By the end of the process, the country will have two more judges and two more magistrates than it had before. This is intended as a step to help improve efficiency in the courts and increase the speed at which justice is served. Particularly, more magistrates need to be assigned to hear domestic violence cases. This is an urgent issue. Domestic violence victims need swift action in order to help them.
More generally, court delays have been an issue the country has been facing for years. We must keep in mind the sheer number of court cases that take place. Bringing in more members of the judiciary will help of course, but a lot more needs to be done.
While increasing the number of members of the judiciary is a good first step… what’s the next step?
Well for one thing, the government and the Court Services Agency must ensure that all the support staff required by the new judges and magistrates is in place, trained and ready to start working.
Secondly, perhaps it wouldn’t be a bad idea to increase the number of support staff for all members of the judiciary in general.
Other things can also be done. Chamber of Advocates President Louis de Gabriele had told this newsroom that the way case management hearings are handled could be changed. He described these as not including anything substantive about the case being heard in court. He gave an example of such a hearing, wherein a judge would ask for more information and one would go to court simply to determine whether there is or isn't information, for instance. “This can be avoided.” He said such hearings could instead be heard by the court clerks or instead one could just correspond with the deputy registrar instead.
Such a move might free up more time for the judiciary.
Recently, there was a change in the way appeals are heard. “We used to be very critical of appeals. We had a waiting list of between four-and-a-half and five. The changes - which the Chamber was a promoter of - removing the sitting for an appeal unless the court insists that it takes place, have streamlined appeals that can now be decided in nine months rather than left waiting for five years,” de Gabriele said.
Perhaps we could identify more ways to increase efficiency in the courts in other kinds of court cases?
Former Chief Justice Vincent de Gaetano believes that an overhaul of the criminal court procedures should be considered in the long term. The longterm aim should be to consider an overhaul directed towards ensuring that a criminal case begins and ends without interruption, “with the hearing being conducted throughout the day and possibly the following day and the one after, so on and so forth. Judgement would then be handed down at the end of the hearing,” he said. This of course would require a major overhaul in the way the courts work.
In addition to all this, the issue of space must also be addressed. During his speech on the opening of the forensic year, Chief Justice Mark Chetcuti said that there is hardly any space for people to sit down in corridors. The government should focus on utilising new buildings in the vicinity of the courts, he said, mentioning the idea of having specialised courts within their own buildings. He said that there currently isn’t enough space in the building for all judges to work on the same day.
Chamber of Advocates President Louis de Gabriele had said, when asked about space issued by this newsroom, that “I think there's enough space in the courthouse today, but you need to deploy it more efficiently." As an example, he mentioned moving the administration and back office from the court building to elsewhere in Valletta. "You don't need the administration offices to be on the fourth floor. The minute you liberate that space, you've liberated the fourth floor (…) you can easily give access for another six or seven court halls.” He mentioned the registrar and registry possibly staying in the court house. "I would first try to use the space available in court by maximising the capacity. Then let's discuss whether there are some courts that may not have to be in the court house."
Regardless of the options, one thing is for sure… more court rooms are needed.
There are many experts in the country who have ideas which could improv the efficiency of the courts. Perhaps the time has come to sit down with them all and draw up more plans to further tackle court delays. Improvements have been made from years ago, yes, but there is still more to be done.