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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 6 Hansard (22 June) . . Page.. 1731 ..
Mr Wood asked the Minister for Justice and Community Safety, upon notice, on 21 April 1999:
In each week of February and March 1999
(1) How many cases listed for hearing in the Magistrates Court did not
proceed because the Director of Public Prosecution declined to
pursue them.
(2) What was the total court time allocated to the hearing of those
cases.
(3) What is the notional cost of this loss of listed time.
Mr Humphries
: The answer to Mr Wood's questions are as follows:(1) During February and March 1999, there were 153 charges out of a
total of 367 charges preferred against 72 defendants withdrawn and
dismissed by the Court after the prosecution offered no evidence.
16 defendants had all charges withdrawn with the other 56 defendants being proceeded against on a lesser number of charges.
(2) The total time allocated to the hearing of all charges against all the
above defendants was 452 hours with the total charges withdrawn
estimated at 110 hours of hearing time saved. The actual time
allocated in respect of the cases where all charges were withdrawn
was 38.5 hours.
(3) Only 3 cases listed for a total of 11 hours resulted in lost time and a
possible cost to the Court as the Court regularly overlists by 100%
ie: 10 hours for a 5 hour list. The estimated cost to the Court for a
day's sitting is $2,000 or $400 per hour.
This however presumes that the Magistrates were not able to perform other duties or take matters from other list. If there were no other matters for Magistrates to determine on those particular days they would perform chamber work including working on reserved decisions.
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