On 24 October, the Department for the Execution of Judgments participated in a round table held in Ljubljana where the first results of the European Union – Council of Europe joint project “Ensuring the best interests of the child in civil court proceedings” were presented. Key topics were discussed, notably child participation throughout the proceedings, the role of guardians and children’s advocates, custody arrangements, effective cooperation between legal and social services, preventive and protective measures, and family support programmes.
The Department’s interventions focused on the state of play in the execution of the Court’s judgment Q and R v. Slovenia, which was one of the reasons for launching of the project. In this judgment, the Court found a violation of the first applicant’s right to a fair trial on account of the excessively long foster care proceedings. The discussions, in so far as they concerned the execution of the above judgment, focused on the measures taken by the authorities to address one of the main reasons for the excessive length of these proceedings, namely the inadequate provision of experts (child psychologists) and excessive expert workload.
The event brought together around 80 representatives from different authorities including, the Ministry of Justice, District Courts, court experts, Chamber of Clinical Psychologists, social work centres, Office of the Ombudsperson, NGOs and others.
