6th UIHJ-EuroMed Session in Lisbon

The opening of the session was placed under the high authority of his Excellency Secretary of Justice J. Tiago da Silveira who lengthily developed the projections of E-justice in the occupation of Portuguese Solicitadores and hence its modernization as well as that of all procedures in Portugal. He explained why 70% of cases are today transmitted to courts electronically, and that, since January 2009, three million documents were send that way. He was thus pleased with the choice of this subject in the program of the meeting. Jacques Isnard, president of the UIHJ, spoke in his turn and underlined the diversity and the richness of the subjects chosen to be developed in the various workshops by stressing that this constituted a clear recognition of the multi-field activities of the judicial officers promoted since 2000 by the UIHJ. Antonio da Cunha, president of the Portuguese Solicitadores, spoke to welcome all and to officially open the works of this session.

After the opening ceremony, the works of the session started. They were divided into five roundtables.

The 1st roundtable, “Businesses: needs and solutions”, was placed under the chair of Professor Jose de Magalhaes and Antonio Gameiro, with the participation of representatives of the UIHJ-EuroMed delegations from Algeria, France, Greece and Portugal. This roundtable was intended to allow the judicial officers of various countries to analyze the needs of businesses and to know which solutions they can offer apart from debt collecting. The occasion was thus given to confront the various services offered by the profession according to the countries and to determine which new services could be proposed by these professionals. Thus was proposed the possibility for the judicial officer of becoming the “credit-manager” of small and medium-size businesses. The idea of the Euro-Mediterranean network of judicial officers was raised again. On this occasion Francoise Andrieux and Dionysios Kriaris presented the UIHJ-EuroMed website (www.uihj-Euromed.com) which they developed for the intention both of EuroMed Member States and their partners.

The 2nd roundtable, “Alternative modes of conflicts resolution”, was placed under the chair of Professor Mariana Gouveia, with the participation of representatives of UIHJ-EuroMed delegations from Algeria, France and Portugal. The participants gave a report on the importance of alternative modes of conflicts resolution and the current or future participation of the profession in this field.

The 3rd roundtable, “Excessive debts”, was animated by UIHJ-EuroMed delegations from Algeria, France and Portugal. Each one developed the existence of excessive debts and of the possible appropriate procedure to this situation in his respective country and the effects on enforcement procedures in each country.

The 4th roundtable, “Guarantees”, included the participation of UIHJ-EuroMed delegations from Algeria, France and Portugal. The speakers compared the existence and the implementation of various guarantees (apart from conservative measures) into force in their countries: sequestration, mortgages, security, pledge, and clause of reserve of property. The issue of statements of facts was focused on, as the first guarantee of the keeping of evidence.

Lastly, the 5th roundtable, “e-justice”, was placed under the chair of his Excellency Secretary of Justice Jorge Almeida, with the participation of representatives of UIHJ-EuroMed delegations from Greece, France and Portugal. Each country exposed the services brought by e-justice, their advantages and their disadvantages. Services that could be provided electronically, like “Depomail®” or “Authentidoc®” (proposed by French judicial officers) were discussed. Far from being ignored, the dangers of e-justice were on the contrary underlined by Greece. Our Algerian fellow-members exposed at the time of the debate with the participants their large projections in this field.

Recommendations

At the end of the session, and taking into account the debates and presentations, recommendations were made.

Recommendation n° 1

-    Considering the will to privilege alternative modes of conflicts resolution to the profit of solutions privileging the agreement of parties because accepted with their consent
-    Considering the experience of judicial officers with regard to the search for solutions allowing to strike a balance between relations of debtor and creditor,
-    Considering the will to increase the education level of judicial officers

UIHJ-EuroMed recommends that judicial officers aim at extending their activities in particular in the field of alternative modes of conflicts resolution, with an appropriate training and in the strict respect of their statute.

Recommendation n°2

- Considering the impartiality, neutrality, granted trust, and ethics brought by the occupation of judicial officer

UIHJ-EuroMed recommends that the judicial officer is the professional of the finding of evidence, in particular through statements of facts.

Recommendation n°3

- Considering that legal decisions require for their effectiveness a uniqueness of intervention

UIHJ-EuroMed recommends to turn the occupation of judicial officer into a great enforcement profession, allowing the judicial officer to be the professional of the resolution of problems involving non-payment of debts both from natural and legal persons, and through the whole of enforcement proceedings until their final phase, that of the selling of the debtor's assets.

Recommendation n°4

-    Considering the inevitable technological change
-    Considering the will of public authorities to improve the administration of justice due to new technologies
-    Considering the will of the judicial officers to be efficient auxiliaries of justice

UIHJ-EuroMed recommends the participation, the promotion and the research of the use of new technologies to the service of citizens with respect to their basic rights.

Recommendation n° 5

-    Considering that the safety of economic exchanges requires a good mutual knowledge of contracting parties

UIHJ-EuroMed recommends taking action to turn the judicial officer into the professional of economic intelligence by giving him the possibility of getting and keeping information on the solvency of economic partners.

Recommendation n°6

-    Considering that the good enforcement of legal decisions is a guarantee offered by the Rule of law to citizens
-    Considering the will of many states for a patrimonial transparency
-    Considering that enforcement of legal decisions is subordinated to the knowledge of the elements of solvency of the debtor
-    Considering that information thus collected will allow the judicial officer to implement enforcement procedures on the basis of a mediation accepted both by the creditor and the debtor

UIHJ-EuroMed recommends that judicial officers become the agents of the declaration of assets of debtors for the case where those would be compulsory.