Lawyers, legal procurators and notaries will soon have 24-hour access to civil court records through a new online case-management system.

This will mean they will no longer have to waste precious time queuing at the civil registry to track progress of their clients’ cases.

They will be able to access the information they need from their office computer, tablet or smart phone through the new system that will be up and running on October 1, Justice Minister Owen Bonnici announced yesterday.

50,000

– documents filed in the civil registry each year

And, unlike the civil registry, the online information will be accessible 24-hours a day, he said.

The system will allow legal professionals to track the progress of their civil cases by, for example, checking if parties in the case were notified to appear in court.

Dr Bonnici said the acts of civil cases, which include all documents filed, will also soon be online, which would reduce the workload in the court registry.

It was decided to open up the online system to lawyers, legal procurators and notaries – and not to the general public – so as to respect the right to privacy.

The legal professionals could access the system through their electronic ID, which they could apply for through the website mygov.mt. Access would then be granted following the approval of the court registrar.

Dr Bonnici said this was one of several government initiatives to improve the workings of the law courts. Initiatives included a system whereby court rulings and the transcriptions of witnesses’ testimonies were e-mailed directly to legal professionals. Text messages were also being sent to the parties involved when a civil case was deferred to another day.

Law courts director general Frank Mercieca said that, each year, some 50,000 documents were filed in the civil registry.

The case-management system was developed by the Malta Information Technology Agency and was currently being tested. It will be accessible through the website justice.gov.mt.