Page 1109 - Week 04 - Wednesday, 20 March 2013
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classification in the prison of being held on remand rather than sentenced means they often cannot participate in rehabilitation programs. Of course, that is to say nothing of people falsely accused who have to wait years in some cases to have their trials resolved. This is a situation which no citizen should see as acceptable, and the Canberra Liberals do not see it as acceptable.
The pressure continues to mount on the judges themselves. Judges need time to pay due diligence to the case at hand. We do not want them to feel rushed to deliver a decision unduly and in doing so not properly consider all of the arguments. Additionally, a number of cases have been run in the past year citing these very court delays as a reason to challenge refusal of bail or to seek dismissal of cases, thereby adding further to the judicial workload.
The extraordinary delays in our system have led to the ACT Bar Association making a formal complaint in regard to an ACT Supreme Court judge in December 2012 due to extensive delays in reserved judgements. The unprecedented move against a judge demonstrates how dire the crisis in the ACT Supreme Court has become despite the Attorney-General’s recent blitz on the court lists.
The ACT Law Society supports the calls for delays to be resolved, stating that it is seeking urgent remedial action about the state of reserved judgments generally. Further to this, I received yesterday a letter from the ACT Law Society supporting our call for a fifth judge. I understand this letter from the Law Society has been sent not just to me but also to Shane Rattenbury, Simon Corbell and the Chief Justice:
… the council remains concerned that there are again serious delays in obtaining hearing dates and that the status of reserved judgements has not yet substantially improved.
It continues:
But the urgent need is in the ACT Supreme Court. The Society takes the view that the appointment of a fifth judge is appropriate at this time. We note that in the usual course judges retire and decisions as to the number of judges can be reviewed.
For these reasons, the Society fully supports the urgent appointment of a fifth Justice of the Supreme Court.
The decision to appoint a fifth judge is not one that is taken lightly. There are financial implications to doing so; however, the costs of further delaying justice greatly outweigh these considerations.
The ACT has the lowest number of judges per capita in the country. According to the latest report on government services, we have 3.4 judges per 100,000 people. In the comparable jurisdictions, the Northern Territory has 11 and Tasmania has 4.1. We are well below the national average of 4.8.
A New South Wales parliamentary research paper on court delays published in 2002 states:
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