Christchurch already testing proposed legal reforms

Press, 27 April 1984, Page 21

Christchurch already testing proposed legal reforms

Some of the legal reforms proposed recently by a Wellington High Court judge are already being tested in Christchurch. A former president of the New Zealand Law Society, Mr Justice Eichelbaum, has prepared a paper for presentation to the society’s conference in Rotorua this week calling for changes to make the judicial process more accessible and less expensive to the ordinary person. One of his ideas is that the courts, through their officials, bring the parties in a civil dispute together at the outset and make a timetable for the various steps in the litigation. This has been happening in Christchurch since the beginning of the year, according to the District Court Registrar, Mr R. B. Twidle. A pilot scheme restricted to Christchurch was introduced on January 1 to run for six months after which, depending on results, it will be made a permanent feature or dropped.

Mr Twidel says that present indications are that it will be continued. The scheme applies only to civil cases where both parties live in Christchurch and where notice has been given that the hearing will be defended. The disputants and/or their representatives are called to a pre-trial conference presided over by a judge at which the issues to be raised are defined and the relevant matters sorted out. The judicial process can thus be speeded up and steamlined. Mr Twidle says that although the scheme is still in its infancy, it has already proved its efficiency. Cases which might have taken four months or longer to resolve are now being wound up in as many weeks. For the litigants, paying their lawyers by the hour, the timesavings mean cost savings. Another reform suggested by His Honour is that instead of setting every case to be heard at 10 a.m., there

should be a range of start times. While this is already occurring to a limited degree in Christchurch, there is scope through the scheme for it to be extended so that a date and a precise time can be set for the hearing. This is because at the pre-trial conference, the presiding judge can make a more accurate assessment of the time the hearing will take. With the issues at dispute defined in the initial stages, neither party can be embarrassed by last minute disclosures or “ambushed” in court. Also, it is expected that there will be fewer frivolous defences, those filed as a tactical ploy rather than as a gesture of serious intent. This happens “fairly often,” Mr Twidle says, as does its corollary, the eleventh hour out-of-court settlement. Some time-tabling is done now but it is fairly blunt. Basically all that is happening is that different classes of cases are being programmed for particular days at particular times:

® Arrest cases are heard at 10 a.m. and again at 2.15 p.m. • Fines defaulters are called to appear at midday two days a week. ® Applications for limited licences are heard at 2.15 p.m. on one day each week with the rest of the work in that courtroom on that day beginning at 10 a.m. and concluding at the luncheon break. Mr Twidle says that it is almost impossible to programme in fine detail because many cases do not go the full distance. A survey done last year found that less than half the fixtures set down for defended hearings actually proceeded to trial, he says. Others have indicated that the attrition rate may be even higher. Given this, precise timetabling might prove grossly inefficient and wasteful of the resources of the Court. A hearing might be set down for 3 p.m. which, under the present system, could be disposed of in the morning because of other

cases collapsing, changes of plea, people not turning up, and judges “coming free and being able to step in on an over-flow basis.” Mr Twidle says. Also, there is a risk that the litigation process might be unreasonably extended as fewer cases could be safely set for hearing each week there being only so many hours in a sitting day. An increase in the timegap between the plaintiffs first appearance in court and the hearing would cause difficulties for both defence and prosecution. Witnesses may move and become unreachable, memories may dim, pre-trial anxieties would be prolonged. Also, Mr Twidle says, that the needs of prosecuting agencies — the Police Department and the Ministry of Transport — must be recognised as much as possible. Often representatives are called back from leave or off shift work to give evidence and the baldness of present programming allows some flexibility in this regard.