Move to expedite top court rulings
With some 11,000 cases pending at the Council of State, changes planned in adjudication
Delays in the administration of justice by the Council of State, the country’s highest administrative court, is usually the rule rather than the exception, as there are currently 11,000 cases pending.
In fact, many cases are adjourned up to 10 or more times, at the initiative of the judges themselves, and there are extreme cases such as the adjournment of one case 72 times.
Seeking to remedy this state of affairs with the knock-on effects they entail, the government, in cooperation with the Council of State, is reportedly initiating significant changes in the legislation governing the adjudication of cases.
Kathimerini understands that the new procedure for the Council of State will be ready before Easter and will provide that in the future the younger judges, who until now have only played a subsidiary role, will also participate in the processing of cases, thus greatly increasing the number of cases on trial.
The postponements have had wide-reaching consequences, not least on financial investments, with many canceled for fear of legal entanglements. Delays in the administration of administrative justice hurt not only investments but also hundreds of citizen petitions for legal protection.
Tellingly, a recent survey by the European Commission showed that 93% of companies look at the speed of the judicial system before they decide on investing.
The Council of State, which bears the burden of important investments and other cases related to economic development, tourist areas, urban planning issues and others, has, despite the progress of the last 15 years, not yet reached the point of being able to respond to the demands of the times.
The judicial adventure with the tourist investment in Messinia and Costa Navarino is a thing of the past, as in recent years, and especially after the economic crisis and the legislative changes that have been made, major investments have passed through the Council of State after two or three years of legal entanglements, which is a leap forward compared to the past.
The 11,000 untried cases are indeed staggering but pale compared to the past, when at the beginning of 2010 they exceeded 30,000.
Despite these improvements with respect to large investments, hundreds of medium-sized investments get trapped in the administrative justice system, leading to the cancellations of investment ventures.
The situation also adversely affects thousands of cases involving tax, urban planning, environmental issues and so on.
