Judges and magistrates who cause delays by starting sittings late or postponing them should be held accountable, according to the president of the Chamber of Advocates, Reuben Balzan.

“It is... time for Parliament to make the necessary changes in the law to provide the Commission for the Administration of Justice with an effective mechanism to discipline the judiciary where necessary,” he said.

Dr Balzan was reacting to comments made by Justice Minister Chris Said, who recently said he expected judges and magistrates to fine “accused, parties, lawyers and prosecution officers who, presumably without just cause, do not turn up or who try to stall or delay proceedings”.

The issue had been raised by Magistrate Carol Peralta, who condemned delays caused by lawyers and prosecution officers not turning up without due notice.

The Times sent questions to Chief Justice Silvio Camilleri, asking what he thought about the minister’s comments and whether he planned to act on them.

The Chief Justice said he would not reply, given the way The Times had reported recent court cases (see reply in box).

Dr Balzan said that before talking about fining people, the inefficiencies within the court system had to be addressed.

“It is time for the judiciary to agree on a singular harmonised system of case scheduling and management in the interest of society,” he insisted.

In court, he explained, there were 21 judges and 19 magistrates apart from tribunals that demanded the presence of lawyers.

Different courts and tribunals adopted different ways of managing their caseloads.

Some set a specific date and time while others opted for a specific date but no time, calling all cases at 9 a.m.

Cases were then either heard in the order in which they were displayed on the list or on a first-come-first-served basis.

“Clearly, this leads to multiple situations where a lawyer is being called to appear before a particular court while he is in another courtroom. To compound matters further, some courts do not stick to the agreed times, sometimes starting over an hour late for no apparent reason,” he said.

In the case of criminal cases that required the presence of police officers, Dr Balzan suggested grouping a number of cases together and allocating a particular time slot for each group of cases to facilitate scheduling.

“It will be up to the judiciary, the legal profession and also the pro-secutors to exercise the necessary discipline and respect the agreed dates and times of sittings and, of course, for the judiciary to deliver the judgements in acceptable time-frames,” he said. Listing other reasons that caused delays, Dr Balzan said that sometimes courts were not able to start hearing cases because there were no halls available. Some judges did not allow others to use their halls even when vacant, he noted.

Failed notification of court documents also contributed to delays because cases got stuck as one or more of the parties were not notified.

“Clearly, the biggest casualty in this situation is the individual who resorts to the courts to obtain justice and is often the victim of an inefficient system.

“Also casualties in this situation are all those witnesses, lawyers, prosecuting officers and members of the judiciary who are genuinely making an effort on a daily basis to make the system work, notwithstanding the many hurdles,” Dr Balzan said.

What the Chief Justice said

I refuse to cooperate with, and thereby encourage by answering your queries, the kind of deplorable sensation-seeking tabloid reporting which The Times of Malta has been resorting to as of late in connection with judicial events when ordinary day occurrences, such as the ordering of the arrest of non-show persons and the revocation of bail as well as complaints about the failure of attendance of prosecuting officers, have been painted as some rare “noteworthy ” happenings.

A magistrate (Marseann Farrugia) was first painted by your paper as a villain because her order to revoke bail was declared illegal by another magistrate, with her photograph taken on a happy occasion splashed in your paper like a mugshot of a criminal, but then, all of a sudden, she was turned into a heroine because popular feeling evid-ently turned in her favour.

In reality, she has never been either a villain or a heroine but a magistrate who was quietly going about the performance of her duties like many other magistrates who have been doing the same thing without ever having attracted the attention of your court reporter, who seems to labour under the delusion that whatever happens outside his earshot has simply not happened.

In a similar vein was your reporting of a few remarks made by a magistrate (Carol Peralta) venting his frustration at the absence of the prosecuting officer, which remarks have been repeatedly uttered by magistrates from time to time in the course of the execution of their everyday duties without ever being noticed by The Times of Malta, as if the frustrations of a magistrate who has been to Bosnia-Herzegovina carry more weight with The Times of Malta than the frustrations of magistrates who have never been there. Utterly appalling.

So, please, you do not have to wait any longer for replies from me to your queries. I am disappointed that I had to spell out the message, which my silence to date was meant to convey.