“In huge amount of work and hurry we must not lose the key – the quality of work of the Supreme Court”; such wish Ivars Bickovics the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court expressed closing annual revisory plenary session on the 11th of March.    

The record amount - almost 5000 of cases were received in the Supreme Court in 2010. It is almost 50% more than 10 years ago. 4518 cases were reviewed, and this number also twice exceeds number of cases reviewed in 2000. However, the number of judges didn’t increase twice, and it means that work load of judges and employees of the court increased significantly.

In annual revisory plenary session chairs of Departments of the Senate and Chambers mentioned in their reports both figures characterising work done in 2010 and spoke about problems, expressing suggestions for solutions of problems.

 

The Department of Civil Cases of the Senate

Balance for the beginning of the year was 618 cases, 1393 cases were received, 1136 cases were reviewed, and 875 cases were pending at the end of the year. In 37% of cases reviewed initiation of cassation litigation was rejected.  

Zigmants Gencs the Chair of the Department of Civil Cases of the Senate informed about decisions adopted concerning organization of work in the department to reduce balance of cases: procedure of distribution of cases for assignment sittings and sittings of the Senate has been improved, “separator” for assignment sittings has been enforced as well as for denials to initiate cassation litigation in cases, if stable case-law has already been formed or if there are no doubts in rule of law of the verdict of appellate instance and case that is being reviewed doesn’t have any meaning in creation of the case-law.   

However, it is impossible to solve the problem without improvement of legal regulations. The Chair of the Department of Civil Cases of the Senate mentioned several suggestions, for example, to exclude rights of the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and the Chair of the Department of Civil Cases to submit protests upon rulings of court being in force from the Article 483 of Civil Procedure Law, leaving this right only to Prosecutor General; review of cases in written proceedings, thus reviewing all ancillary complaints.  

Z. Gencs indicated that it was necessary to search for legal solutions to decrease number of cases, excluding possibility to litigate for litigation, for small amounts of money, suggesting that amendments to Civil Procedure Law made by Saeima that would increase amount of deposit, would be a positive factor.

 

The Department of Criminal Cases of the Senate

Balance for the beginning of the year was 38 cases, 660 cases were received, 644 cases were reviewed, and 54 cases were pending at the end of the year. In 64% of cases reviewed check of rule of law in cassation proceedings was rejected.

Pavels Gruzins, the Chair of the Department of Criminal Cases of the Senate indicated that work load of the Senate was reduced significantly due amendments to Criminal Procedure Law made in 2005, which allow to reject check of ruling in cassation proceedings, if claim submitted is not grounded with infringement of law, as well as review cases in written proceedings. However, the Chair of the Department considered instability of laws and frequent amendments to laws to be a problem. P. Gruzins also expressed dissatisfaction about limit established last year. This limit states that only those judges, who reached age of 40 years, may pretend for the post in the Supreme Court. Probably, this fact, as well as unclear vote against Dr. iur. Andrejs Judins for the post of the senator is attempt of members of Parliament to weaken the Supreme Court, - P. Gruzins mentioned.

 

The Department of Administrative Cases of the Senate

Balance for the beginning of the year was 256 cases, 956 cases were received, 911 cases were reviewed, and 301 cases were pending at the end of the year. In 29% of cases reviewed initiation of cassation litigation was rejected.

Veronika Krumina, the Chair of the Department of Administrative Cases of the Senate expressed opinion that it was impossible to decrease number of cases in courts only by internal effectivisation of work processes of courts; political desire to make amendments in Administrative Procedure Law is also needed, for example, possibility to review case in written proceedings also in the first and appellate instances and increase stamp duty and deposit to limit submission of groundless claims. The Chair of the Department mentioned an example that 10 permanent filers make annual load of one senator, however, the ruling is negative in 98% of these cases. V. Krumina also indicated necessity for municipalities and governmental institutions to follow the case-law and discontinue useless litigation, spending money of taxpayers even for external services of lawyers.  

In its turn, Veronika Krumina considered improvement of Court Information System (CIS), sustainment of the Division of the Case-law and restoration of the Division of Complaints in the Supreme Court to be internal possibilities to make work of the court more effective.   

However, V. Krumina also expressed incomprehension regarding limit of 40 years established for judges of the Supreme Court. She mentioned the Department of Administrative Cases as a positive example, as young judges do work there.

 

The Chamber of Civil Cases

Balance for the beginning of the year was 1187 cases, 1644 cases were received, 1514 cases were reviewed, and 1317 cases were pending at the end of the year.

Gunars Aigars, the Chair of the Chamber of Civil Cases admitted that great accumulation of civil cases in courts, inter alia in the Chamber of Civil Cases is a result of bulky Civil Procedure Law. At present the law provides too many rights for negotiations to parties, the Chair of the Chamber concluded.  The appellate proceedings should be moved to written proceedings, and the Senate should be given rights to choose cases to be reviewed in order to create case-law. The function of suggesting laws is not provided for the Supreme Court, but the court may turn to ministry of commission of Parliament with concrete suggestions. Unfortunately, judges of Chambers do not have time enough to prepare and promote amendments to laws due their work load.

 

The Chamber of Criminal Cases

Balance for the beginning of the year was 371 cases, 317 cases were received, 313 cases were reviewed, and 375 cases were pending at the end of the year.

Ervins Kuskis, the Chair of the Chamber of criminal Cases admitted that his prognoses made last year didn’t fulfil. He thought that amount of cases sent to the Chamber would decrease for a half due to amendments regarding competence of cases. However, accumulations of cases will decrease in several years both due competence of cases and due decrease of criminal offences in general.

The greatest problem of the Chamber is postponement of cases. Every second court hearing was postponed last year. The most frequent reasons are absence of accused and their defence counsels in the court hearing. The Chair of the Chamber stressed that it was necessary to think of how to decrease number of accused parties being ill and their “weakly” advocates. Eriks Kalnmeiers, the Prosecutor General and Ivars Bickovics, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court also pointed out the problem of groundless sick-lists.  

In his turn, the Chair of the Chamber is cautious about possibility to decrease search for new proofs in appellate instance, as insufficient assessment of proofs and fixation of testimonies is one of reasons, why the Senate withdraws rulings of appellate instance.  

 

The Division of Case-law

Nora Magone, d. d. of the Head of the Division of Case-law informed that two studies of case-law were implemented in cooperation with researchers in field of law in 2010: in case-law about compensation of moral harm in criminal proceedings and in case-law of the Department of Civil Cases of the Senate in cases about individual disputes in field of labour. 213 rulings of the Senate are placed in the case-law database, and 206 rulings are placed on the home page of the Supreme Court.  

Insufficient number of employees of the Division of case-law is a problem. Zigrida Mita, the Head of the division terminated her work last year, and there is no regular head in the division.

 

Administration

Sandra Lapina, the Head of Administration, informed that the budget of the Supreme Court was LVL 2 384 376 in 2010, and it was for 19% less than in 2009. The court couldn’t ensure one of its main functions – analysis of the case-law, in full amount. However, financing for provision of the newly created Board of Justice was not given as well. Financing of LVL 49 500 was given for investments, and it was great opportunity to arrange new rooms for the Department of Administrative Cases and to arrange reading-room.   

The Head of the Administration turned the attention to the fact that number of employees of the court is insufficient, while number of cases sent to the Supreme Court and number of judges increases. Assessment of work processes of chanceries and Administration has been made to optimise them more effectively. Evaluation of employees was implemented in 2010, and according to this evaluation non-material motivation of employees was used. However, in circumstances of decreased budget the Supreme Court also provided training and good working conditions for judges and employees.

Except for additional financing, using knowledge and time of judges and employees, the Supreme Court operated in field of social legal education, organising the conference about the case-law of the Senate, publishing the bulletin of the court, organising lessons of law for pupils and teachers and meetings with students.

Priorities of the Administration in 2011 are effective financial management, provision of qualitative human resources complying to amount of work, active participation in social legal education and implementation of elements of management system in organisation of work.  

 

Summary

Summarising the results of work of the Supreme Court in 2010, Ivars Bickovics, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, admitted that judges and employees of the court had worked unselfishly and great job was done. The Chief Justice indicated that solution of problems named by heads of structural units, mostly doesn’t depend on the Supreme Court directly, but he asked judges to define and express their suggestions and initiatives more actively.

In the end of the plenary session judges discussed the way, how to activate problems and solutions rang in plenary session more effectively.  

 

Information prepared by

Rasma Zvejniece, the Head of the Division of Communication of the Supreme Court

E-mail: rasma.zvejniece@at.gov.lv, telephone: 67020396, 28652211