CEPEJ conducted on 22-23 January 2020, the first session of a court coaching programme for two pilot courts, in cooperation with the Court Administration of Latvia. The session, held in the premises of the Riga Regional Court, was moderated by Ms Daiga Vilsone, President of the Riga Regional Court, and attended also by the leadership of the Zemgale District Court. It aimed at agreeing on priorities and activities to be undertaken by the pilot courts, with the CEPEJ support, with a view to strengthening the court management and performance.
The CEPEJ methodology and tools related to evaluating the judiciary as a whole or individual courts and to improving the efficiency and quality of judicial services were presented. An exchange of information was conducted on judicial time management, avoiding or reducing the backlog of cases, digital transformations, and managing the quality of judicial services with a particular focus on user satisfaction.
In addition, the Court Administration of Latvia presented a draft methodology for the assessment of courts’ workload, primarily developed for determining whether the resources are fairly distributed among courts. An initial exchange of opinions on this methodology took place among the participating CEPEJ experts, judges, representatives of the Ministry of Justice and of the Supreme Court.
As a follow-up to this court coaching session, the participants agreed to develop concrete actions that will aim at improving the court communication, court management and digital tools at the disposal of court presidents with a view to exercising their increased responsibilities. The pilot courts will also be actively involved in the development and testing of the methodologies for the assessment of courts’ workload, case weighting, and performance-based budgeting.
This activity was organised in the framework of the joint Council of Europe and European Union project “Strengthening the access to justice in Latvia through fostering mediation and legal aid services, as well as support to the development of judicial policies and to increased quality of court management” funded through the European Commission’s Structural Reform Support Programme.