The Keeper of the Seals unveiled this Thursday around sixty measures to improve the functioning of justice and meet the expectations expressed during the eight months of consultations with the Estates General, launched at the end of 2021.
” Citizens tell us: justice is too slow and yet it has no time to devote to us, this forces us “, noted Éric Dupond-Moretti, who promises” resources commensurate with the challenges with an additional 7.5 billion euros by 2027, i.e. a justice budget increased by nearly 60% at the end of Emmanuel Macron’s two five-year terms, according to the minister, who also confirmed the creation of 10 000 positions, including 1,500 magistrates and as many court clerks. ” We will thus have recruited as many magistrates in 5 years as in the last 20 years “, underlines the Keeper of the Seals.
The minister knows he is expected at the turn: a year after an unprecedented platform signed by thousands of magistrates to shout their ” suffering “, jurisdictions continue to sound the alarm while prison overcrowding is breaking records.
Faced with this latent crisis, the Minister said that he shared the observation of victim justice ” of more than thirty years of abandonment and promised to allocate the necessary budgets to his plan. ” Of course, this is not the first reform, but it is undoubtedly the first time that a justice reform has been accompanied by means commensurate with the challenges. “, he assured.
Accelerate procedures
Among the arsenal of measures announced, several aim to speed up procedures. At the heart of the attention, civil justice, these everyday disputes such as divorces, real estate or insurance disputes which represent 60% of the decisions rendered. The stated objective is to halve processing times, which are currently two years on average.
For that, “ need to change software “says the Keeper of the Seals, who is betting on the development of amicable settlements, inspired by Dutch and German models, such as the “caesura”, which will allow the judge to decide on questions of rights, but then to entrust the parties with s agree on the issue of compensation.
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On the penal side, more efficient justice also rhymes with simplification and modernization. With an announced challenge: the overhaul of the 3,200 pages of the criminal procedure code.
With regard to record prison overcrowding, the Minister preferred to highlight the existing reforms, the plan to build 15,000 prison places and its measures to prevent recidivism. “ I’ll tell you a secret: I would love to have a magic wand, I would love to go faster “, he confessed, inviting to “ measure what has been done “.
(With AFP)