Strasbourg, 10 December 2009

CEPEJ(2009)14Rev

europEAN COMMISSION FOR THE EFFICIENCY OF Justice (CEPEJ)

14th plenary meeting (9-10 December 2009)

Abridged report

A.   FOREWORD

The European Commission for the Efficiency of Justice (CEPEJ) held its 14th plenary meeting in Strasbourg on 9 – 10 December 2009. The meeting was chaired by Mr Fausto de SANTIS (Italy).

The agenda appears in the Appendix.

B.   LIST OF ITEMS DISCUSSED AND DECISIONS TAKEN BY THE CEPEJ

1.   Information by the President of the CEPEJ and the Secretariat

The CEPEJ

§  took note of the information given by its President, its members and its Secretariat who participated in various fora where the work of the CEPEJ was introduced and discussed;

2.   Study Session

§  welcomed the presentations and the discussions on the measurement of the performance of judicial systems and courts, highlighted the pre-eminent position of this issue for improving the efficiency and the quality of a public service of justice turned to court users while safeguarding the independence of judges and instructed its working groups to take into account the content of this debate in their current and future work, so that it remains a major concern of the CEPEJ's agenda; 

§  agreed to post on the CEPEJ's web site a special file including in particular the presentations made at the study session;

3.   Recent developments in the judicial field in the Council of Europe member states

§  took note of the information given by representatives Albania, Croatia, France, Germany, Ireland, Moldova, Monaco, Montenegro, "the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia", Turkey and United Kingdom on recent domestic developments in the judicial field and invited its members to forward to the Secretariat written information and useful references which could be included in the area "country profiles" of its web site;

 

§  took note of the priorities of the Swiss Presidency of the Committee of Ministers introduced by its member in respect of Switzerland and thanked the Swiss authorities for having invited the Network of pilot courts and the Steering group of the SATURN Centre to meet in Geneva on 12 – 14 April 2010;

4.     Evaluation of European judicial systems

§  took note of the report by the experts and the Secretariat on the peer evaluation visits on judicial statistics in Malta and in the Russian Federation, agreed to pursue the cycle of evaluation visits in 2010 with Northern European countries (for Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden) and Turkey and noted that Germany and Moldova would confirm their possible candidature in the coming weeks,

 

§  noted that an in-depth study on the role of lawyers in judicial procedures, led by the CCBE, was under preparation and invited its members who would have not done it so far to answer to the complementary questionnaire prepared by the CCBE within the framework of this study; noted that a report on the organisation of the court clerk office, prepared by the Association Alumni for the Centre of Interdisciplinary Postgraduate Studies (ACIPS) in Bosnia-Herzegovina should be completed at the request of the CEPEJ-GT-EVAL before being submitted to the CEPEJ for approval; noted that a report on "single judge and panels of judges" was under preparation by MEDEL; thanked all the instances that had accepted to undertake these studies;

§  invited its members and the national correspondents to take appropriate measures so that the replies to the Evaluation Scheme are submitted to the Secretariat, through its electronic version, before 31 December 2009;

§  warmly thanked the authorities of Switzerland for having seconded to the Secretariat an expert to assist the CEPEJ-GT-EVAL in the preparation of the draft report and took note that the Secretariat had appointed a scientific expert entrusted with judicial data processing;

§  entrusted the CEPEJ-GT-EVAL to prepare the draft report  "European judicial systems – Edition 2010" and to submit it to the 15^th plenary meeting;

5.     Quality of justice

§  supported the ongoing work within the CEPEJ-GT-QUAL and invited the Group to finalise for its 15^th CEPEJ's plenary meeting a study on the quality systems in Europe, guidelines on the contractualisation of judicial proceedings as well as a handbook on the satisfaction surveys aimed at court users of justice which would have been previously trialled within the Network of pilot courts;

6.   SATURN Centre on judicial time management

§  instructed the Steering Group of the SATURN Centre to continue its work in order to set up a European observatory on judicial timeframes and design the appropriate tools, while drawing on the expertise of the Network of pilot courts;

7.   Enforcement of court decisions

§  adopted the Guidelines for a better implementation of the Council of Europe's Recommendation on enforcement (CEPEJ(2009)11), decided to submit them to the Committee of Ministers so that it can take note of it and invited its members to disseminate them widely to policy makers and courts of their countries and to facilitate their translation, where appropriate;

8.   CEPEJ Network of Pilot Courts

§  welcomed the conclusions of the 4th plenary meeting of the Network and invited the CEPEJ's members as well as the Pilot Courts to implement these conclusions (CEPEJ(2009)7) in 2010;

9.   Targeted co-operation with member states

§  approved its experts' report "assessing the Portuguese policy on procedural flows and fight against judicial backlogs (CEPEJ-COOP(2009)1);

§  welcomed the information given by its member in respect of Armenia as a follow up to the experts' report on court organisation in Armenia (CEPEJ-COOP(2009)3) and agreed to pursue its targeted cooperation on this basis in 2010;

§  took note of the information given by the experts and the Secretariat following their visit to Malta to carry out an evaluation of the functioning of the judicial system (2 – 4 December 2009), instructed the experts to finalise as soon as possible a report including concrete recommendations and entrusted its Bureau to forward this report to the authorities in Malta;

§  agreed to cooperate with Azerbaijan to assess the on-going reforms aimed at setting up and administrative court system;

10.  Integration of the Lisbon Network within the CEPEJ's activity programme

§  according to Article 3.e of its Statute, decided to include the European Network for the exchange of information between persons and entities responsible for the training of judges and public prosecutors (Lisbon Network) into its activity programme and entrusted its Bureau to define the working modalities of this Network with the CEPEJ, taking into account the proposals made by the Network's members and in ensuring the establishment of a proper cooperation with the CCJE;

11.  Activity programme of the CEPEJ

§  adopted the CEPEJ's Medium term programme (CEPEJ(2009)4) and subsequently its activity programme for 2010 (CEPEJ (2009)10) and decided to forward them to the Committee of Ministers so that it can take note of them;

§  invited the member states, through the CEPEJ members, where appropriate, to propose to the Secretariat by 15 January 2010 qualified experts to participate in the working groups and entrusted its Bureau to appoint members of these working groups taking into account these proposals;

12.  Relations between the CEPEJ and the other bodies of the Council of Europe

§  took note of the information on the activities of the Consultative Council of European Judges (CCJE), the Consultative Council of European Prosecutors (CCPE), the European Committee of Legal Cooperation (CDCJ), the European Committee on Crime Problems (CDPC) and the Steering Committee on Human Rights (CDDH);

§  welcomed in particular cooperation between the CEPEJ, through the Steering group of the SATURN Centre, and the Committee of experts on effective remedies for excessive length of proceedings (DH-RE) which finalised a draft recommendation on effective remedies for excessive length of proceedings as well as of Guide of good practice aimed at being joined to the Recommendation, which draws in particular on the work of the CEPEJ as regards judicial time management;

§  also welcomed cooperation between the CEPEJ and the Group of Specialists on the judiciary (CJ-S-JUD) and the active participation of its representative in the work aimed at reviewing Recommendation R(94)12 on the independence, efficiency and role of judges;

§  agreed to pursue its very good cooperation with the Consultative Council of European Judges (CCJE) so as to ensure the proper articulation between its recent work on enforcement of court decisions and the work which would be undertaken by the CCJE in 2010 on this topic;

13.  Cooperation with the European Union

§  took note of the information given by the representatives of Sweden and Spain, speaking on behalf of the outgoing and incoming presidencies of the European Union, on the recent and foreseen developments within the Union in the field of justice, as well as of the information given by the representative of the Secretariat General of the European Union, whom it welcomed;

§  reiterated its full disposal to cooperate with the relevant bodies of the European Union for the implementation of the Stockholm Programme as regards evaluation of judicial systems, drawing on its specific expertise;

§  welcomed the continuation of the joint organisation of the « Crystal Scales of Justice » by the Council of Europe, within the framework of the CEPEJ's activity programme, and the European Commission in 2010;

§  invited its members to promote the European Day of Justice in their country around 25 October 2010 ;

14.  Observers with the CEPEJ

§  took noteof the information given by its Observers, thanked them for their concrete contribution to its activities and invitedthem to further contribute to the implementation of its programme of activities;

15.   Election of one member the Bureau

§  elected in replacement of Ms Ivana BORZOVA (Czech Republic), Mr Georg STAWA (Austria) as member of the Bureau for a one year period;

16.   Any other business

§   took note of the request by the authorities of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for the CEPEJ to organise a mission for evaluating the functioning of their justice system and entrusted the Secretariat to consult the relevant bodies of the Council of Europe before giving a positive reply to this request, which it saw as a strong signal of the appreciation of the CEPEJ's work even beyond European borders; if appropriate, the CEPEJ would be able to draw on the existing bilateral contacts between some of the member states and the UAE.

AGENDA

1.      Opening of the meeting

2.     Adoption of the agenda    

Working document

CEPEJ/ODJ(2009)2

3.     Information by the President of the CEPEJ and the Secretariat

4.     Study session: measuring the performance of judicial systems and courts Wednesday 9 December – 9.30 9.30      General introduction: justice as a public service Jean-Paul JEAN, Prosecutor, Court of Appeal of Paris, Associated Professor at the Law faculty of Poitiers, France), Chairman of the CEPEJ-GT-EVAL 9.45      How to measure court performance while safeguarding the fundamental principles of justice? François PAYCHERE, Judge at the Court of justice of the Geneva canton, Switzerland, Chairman of the CEPEJ-GT-QUAL             10.00    Discussion 10.15    Is there a relationship between court size and court performance?                   Georg STAWA, Public Prosecutor, Directorate for Central Administration and Coordination, Federal Ministry of Justice, Austria, Member of the CEPEJ-GT-EVAL             10h30   Discussion                                     11h00 Pause          11h30   Is it possible to measure court performance? The lessons from the evaluation system in the Netherlands Frans van der DOELEN, Programme Manager, Department of the Justice System, Ministry of Justice, The Netherlands, Member of the CEPEJ-GT-EVAL 11h45   New management policies in the courts of the Russian Federation Vyacheslav PANTELEEV, President of the Odintsovo City Court of the Moscow Region 12h00   Towards CEPEJ's indicators of court performance? Presentation of preliminary works by Georg STAWA 12h15   Discussion

5.     Recent developments in the judicial field in the Council of Europe Member states

6.     Evaluation of European judicial systems

1.     Information on the in-depth studies from the 2008 report (Secretariat)

2.     2008 – 2010 evaluation cycle

§  Preparation of the answers to the Evaluation Scheme: on-going work with the national correspondents

§  Information on data processing and Report drafting (Secretariat)

3.     Peer evaluation cooperation process

Rapporteur: Jean-Paul JEAN, Chairman of the CEPEJ-GT-EVAL

7.     Quality of justice (CEPEJ-GT-QUAL)

          i.    Presentation of the draft Study on quality systems in Europe

Rapporteur: François PAYCHERE, Chairman of the CEPEJ-GT-QUAL

        ii.    Presentation of the draft Handbook for carrying out of surveys of the court user’s satisfaction within the member states of the Council of Europe

Rapporteur: Jean-Paul JEAN, Scientific expert (France)

8.     SATURN Centre on judicial time management

Rapporteur: Jacques BÜHLER, Chair of the Steering group

              i.    Cooperation with the Network of pilot courts

            ii.    Designing tools for setting up the European Observatory of judicial timeframes

9.     Execution of court decisions: discussion of the draft Guidelines prepared by the CEPEJ-GT-EXE, in view of their adoption

Rapporteur: Georg STAWA (Austria), member of the CEPEJ-GT-EXE

10.  CEPEJ Network of Pilot Courts

Rapporteur: John STACEY, Vice-President of the CEPEJ

              i.    4^th plenary meeting of the Network (Strasbourg, 10 September 2009)

            ii.    Setting up of clusters

11.  Targeted co-operation of the CEPEJ with Member states

              i.    Portugal: information of the follow up given by the Portuguese authorities to the CEPEJ's reports on policies to ease procedural flows and fight backlogs and on dematerialization and use of IT in the justice field

            ii.    Malta: evaluation of the efficiency of the justice system (expert mission of 2 – 3 December 2009)

           iii.    Armenia: follow up to the 2009 report on the organisation of justice

           iv.    Other requests for 2010

12.   Possible integration of the Lisbon Network within the CEPEJ's activity programme

Rapporteur: Elsa GARCIA MALTRAS de BLAS (Spain)

13.  Discussion of the draft Mid term programme of the CEPEJ, in view of its adoption

Rapporteur: Kristian TURKALJ (Croatia)

14.  Discussion of the draft Activity programme of the CEPEJ for 2010 in view of its adoption

Rapporteur: Irakli ADEISHVILI (Georgia)

15.  Relations between the CEPEJ and the other bodies of the Council of Europe

              i.    Consultative Council of European Judges (CCJE)

            ii.    Consultative Council of European Prosecutors (CCPE)

           iii.    European Committee on Legal Cooperation (CDCJ)

           iv.    European Committee on Crime Problems (CDPC)

             v.    Steering Committee for Human Rights (CDDH)

16.  Co-operation with the European Union

              i.    Last developments within the European Union in the judicial field

Rapporteurs: Anne RAPP (Sweden) and Elsa GARCIA MATRAS de BLAS (Spain) on behalf of the outgoing and incoming presidencies of the European Union 

            ii.    European Day of Justice and Crystal Scales of Justice (Secretariat)

17.  Observers to the CEPEJ

18.  Election of a member of the Bureau

19.  Any other business