ocp192_en

Chart 26 Graph 15.1. Greek Courts Performance in 20133. Programme implementation3.5.4. Reforming the judicial system to support economic activity107. The work on the improvements of the functioning of the courts progressed well. The datacollection on court activity continues to improve allowing a better assessment of the situation of thecourts.108. In administrative justice, past measures have restored the structural balance between inflows andoutflows of cases. Analyses of the data confirm that this holds for all courts. However, the newimproved clearance rates will not be sufficient to reduce significantly the stock of outstanding caseswithin a reasonable timescale. New measures have therefore to be designed to address this problem, asa report from the Ministry on the effect of past measures points out. Over time, the effect of theadministrative review of cases the Ministry is proposing to put in place should help reducing the inflowof cases.109. For civil justice, the authorities are preparing the reform of civil procedure. A report of theMinistry of Justice presents the existing strategy and proposes some new ways forward. Reforms areneeded since, contrary to the administrative courts, the civil justice courts are still not able to balancethe number of cases registered with sufficient closure of cases. The main new action will take placethrough a fundamental reform of civil procedure. The draft of the code of civil procedure has beensubmitted to public consultation in March and is expected for adoption by May 2014. The strategy alsoincludes the development of out of court settlement mechanism, and the full opening of the mediatoractivity to all professions, voted in April. This should help over time to reduce the number of casesgoing to court.Box 15. Greek courts performanceAdministrative justice has restored its structural balance with outflows more than matching inflows. The trends are reliable,even though some courts did not submit complete data, including Piraeus (which accounts for 12% of cases), and thus, thenumbers are not complete per se. The issue now is to take care of the backlog of pending cases. The authorities committed toprovide a proposal to this effect in April.On the contrary, civil justice still has structural problems, mainly in districts courts. The Code of civil procedure (CCP), to bevoted in May, should address the structural balance. After the CCP is voted, it will be possible to tackle the stock of pendingcases. This may be done in parallel with insolvency cases, since part of the problems of the magistrate's courts come fromthese cases.180%160%Chart 15.1. Greek Courts Performance in 2013Council of StateClearance Rate140%120%100%80%Appeal Civil Courts1st Instance Civil CourtsSupreme CourtDistrict Civil CourtsAppeal AdministrativeCourts1st InstanceAdministrative Courts60%40%0.00 0.50 1.00 1.50 2.00 2.50 3.00 3.50Pending Cases / Annual OutflowNote: Tripoli (ΤΡΙΠΟΛΗ) Appeal Administrative Court, Plomari-Lesvos (ΠΛΩΜΑΡΙ-ΛΕΣΒΟΣ) DistrictCivilCourtaswellasPiraeus(ΠΕΙΡΑΙΑ),Livadeia (ΛΙΒΑΔΕΙΑ) , Mesonloghi (ΜΕΣΟΛΟΓΓΙ) andKavala(ΚΑΒΑΛΑ) 1st Instance Administrative Courts did not provide complete data andtherefore, were removed from the calculations for all the quarters | Source: Ministry of Justice Quarterly Data59