Lord Judge, the Lord Chief Justice, raised concerns about finance and delays in the courts in a speech this week.
Lord Judge, the Lord Chief Justice, raised concerns about finance and delays in the courts in a speech this week.
Speaking at the judges’ dinner in Mansion House, Lord Judge said demand for court services had “steadily increased”. Public law applications in the family courts increased by 31% between 2008 and 2009, and private law applications by 19%.
Time restraints needed to be applied in family cases, he said. The courts could “no longer afford the luxury” of allowing parties in family cases—largely supported by public funds—to “dictate the length of the case and take as long as they think they want”, he said.
Where children were involved, their welfare required the speedy resolution of parental disputes.
He warned: “If the end result of our national financial crisis is that all these cases take much longer to be resolved, then justice will have been damaged...the fiscal realities will be hitting the system of justice at just the time when the demands on it are increasing.”
Lord Judge also mused on the treatment of children in the courts.
“Does our traditional, adversarial system continue to provide the best means of enabling judges to decide those desperately sensitive cases involving the future of children? We really must consider whether these processes are the best in the year 2010.”
