National criticise backlog of cases before courts

National says the court system is failing to deliver access to justice because it is log jammed but the Government says it is performing well in the face of an increased work load.

In Parliament yesterday National Party MP Kate Wilkinson said under Labour the median waiting-time for criminal jury trials in the High Court had increased by 62 per cent since 2003.

"It has gone up from six months to 10 months, and is doubling in Auckland, and tripling in centres like Blenheim."

She said the number of outstanding High Court criminal jury cases had increased by 79 per cent since 2002, including a doubling of the number of cases in Auckland, Dunedin, Hamilton, Rotorua, Wellington, and Whangarei.

In a related statement she said there were 241 outstanding criminal trials in the High Court as of March, 1437 in district courts and the median trial waiting time in the High Court was 290 days and 256 days in district courts.

Courts Minister Rick Barker said the courts were dealing with bigger workloads.

"The court does not have any control over the number of applications that are filed with a court; the court simply deals with them," he said.

He said government funding had improved the situation.

"We have invested another $156 million into justice. We have appointed more judges and more staff, and we have put in place more information technology systems and built more buildings.

"We have invested heavily into the system, and the rates of disposal in our courthouses have gone up dramatically."

He said the number of High Court cases completed had increased by 9.4 per cent in the past two years and the figure was 8 per cent for District courts.