Page 3320 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 18 September 1990
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Mr Collaery may reply later. He is talking about a unified structure. Is it going to be only judges? He is talking about levels of court; but do we need all judges? I have a fear. If we have all judges, even though there may be levels of court, the idea of all judges denotes a whole heap of other principles, of other factors that will apply. So think of the alternatives.
In recent times, in the ACT as elsewhere, alternative systems have been proposed and are working well. Last year's budget, the Follett budget, introduced financing for a conflict resolution service, and there are a variety of options in that area to resolve conflicts well away from court structures. I hope that this Government will seek to expand that service, to widen it to cover a wider range of eventualities. I know that in the ACT courts a great deal of time is now being given to case management, to see that things are programmed better and flow through rather more efficiently. I have seen some reports that suggest that this, though difficult to introduce, is overwhelmingly the most effective way of reducing costs of our court systems and of reducing the case delays. Let us use simple management techniques. Let us go for high technology, if you like; computerised procedures and all sorts of modern systems.
But let us not forget at the same time that it is the person who counts. Those delays are extraordinarily expensive for the Government and they are very expensive also for the people facing the courts, and surely we would claim the courts are there to serve those people. I would also want to put in a plea that the costs of some of the civil court cases ought to be completely borne by the parties. There are many cases that go through the courts where one major firm challenges another firm. Why should the community have to pay for that?
Mr Collaery: Especially when they are from out of the jurisdiction.
MR WOOD: Indeed. Why should we have to pay? Thank you. So let us see that we have a scale of fees that makes sure that there is no cost to the community in that. Can we have a look at the court recesses? The court has fairly long recesses. Now, there may be good reasons for that. You do not want to comment on this one, Mr Collaery? All right. There may be good reasons for that. I am not aware of them. Nobody has told me what they are.
Mr Duby: There is always a duty judge, though, Bill.
MR WOOD: Ah, there is always a duty judge. But why should we not have shifts so that courts sit right through the Christmas vacation? I suppose there should be a few days off as everybody has over the Christmas-New Year period. Why are we not having shifts so that there are continuous court sittings? It happens in a magistrates court; why not
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