The Keeper of the Seals unveiled this Thursday around sixty measures which seek to respond to the conclusions of the Estates General of Justice. Objective: with an increase in the budget, to convince the magistrates who have been strongly mobilized in recent months.
Long-awaited announcements. After a report which had upset the magistrates, Éric Dupond-Moretti unveiled this Thursday morning during a press conference in Paris his “action plan” from the Estates General of Justice. The Keeper of the Seals recognized “an unprecedented challenge”.
On the menu of his commitments, the increase in the budget of his ministry which will increase from 9.6 billion to 11 billion euros in 2027.
“A justice that is too slow and too complex”
There is urgency when the conclusions of this major consultation launched last year by Emmanuel Macron had denounced “the advanced dilapidation” of the institution.
“What did our fellow citizens tell us? That justice was too slow and too complex,” said the former lawyer.
Over five years, this commitment represents an additional envelope of 7.5 billion euros, a budgetary effort which far exceeds that granted under the five-year term of Nicolas Sarkozy (+2 billion) as under that of François Hollande (+2.1 billion).
10,000 job creations
This funding will be secured in a forthcoming programming and orientation law to finance the promises to hire 10,000 justice officials by the end of the five-year term, including 1,500 magistrates, and to mitigate the “chronic under-formatting of the workforce” noted by the States General.
Éric Dupond-Moretti also wants to speed up the procedures of civil justice which decides in particular on divorce cases or disputes between employees and workers.
The minister announced that he wanted to “halve” the processing times. In Toulouse, for example, the average time to obtain a divorce hearing is 2 years.
Lead to the construction of 15,000 prison places
Another objective defended by the Keeper of the Seals: “to continue and finalize the plan for 15,000 prison places”, a campaign promise by Emmanuel Macron in 2017. Only 2,000 have already come out of the ground. Dominique Simonnot, the controller general of places of deprivation of liberty recently denounced in a report an “increasingly frightening situation in prisons”.
The picture has become even darker in recent weeks with the record number of prisoners reached in France on November 1 (72,809) and a prison overcrowding rate at its highest (120%).
To “ease tensions within detention”, the Minister of Justice also announced the generalization of the wearing of body cameras for prison guards.
Avoid challenges from magistrates
Finally, with the will of “bringing” citizens closer to justice, the ministry will launch the creation of a smartphone application on which we will find the addresses of courts, lawyers, notaries.
While the magistrates have mobilized on several occasions in recent months, the executive now hopes that these announcements will manage to convince them. The government is keen not to open a new trade union front as the pension reform approaches.
