Courts increase efficiency, need to work on relationship with the press

The Maltese law courts registered improvements in the rate at which cases are being resolved in relation to the number of new cases filed – the speed with which it is resolving pending cases. Nevertheless, Malta is the worst performing country when it comes to the relationship between the courts and the media.

The results come in the form of an EU scoreboard on justice, that seeks to assess clearance rates, accessibility and efficiency, Justice Minister Owen Bonnici said yesterday.

The 2016 EU Justice Scoreboard has registered significant improvements since 2010, even in the areas of bringing women into the justice workforce.

It was found that the courts are taking almost half the time to address civil, commercial, administrative and “other” cases since 2010, the report reads.

In other, bigger countries the judiciary tends to have press officers who explain rulings to the media, but due to Malta’s size and traditions this is not the case. For this reason, Malta scored poorly with regard the judiciary and the press, with Justice Minister Owen Bonnici hinting that the time has come for the Maltese judiciary to have press officers.

The use of ICT in case management was commended, but a number of areas of ICT assessment improvements were not measured because they had been implemented after the scoreboard was being compiled.

The length with which litigious civil and commercial hearings are being resolved has been significantly reduced from 800 days to just above 400, Dr Bonnici said.

It was also described that disputes between citizens and authorities are being addressed and resolved within roughly 500 days, as opposed to the 2,700 days it took on average back in 2010.

The scoreboard ultimately speaks of efficiency, quality and independence perception of the judiciary, the Justice Minister said, expressing his satisfaction at the “great strides” taken to improve the efficiency of the law courts. An EU barometer found that compared with last year, over 60 per cent of respondents had a positive perception of the judiciary’s independence, a slight increase, while a higher proportion responded ‘don’t know’.