Supreme Peoples Court press conference
on the new registration and filing system
One of the frustrations in the Chinese legal system has been that cases filed were often ignored by the court. Dissatisfied fishermen's challenges to the government's settlement with ConocoPhilips for the 2011 Bohai Bay oil spill fell victim to that. When a complaint is filed the court has a short time to accept or reject it. The system was intended to screen out plainly inadequate filings - but it became a way to shirk the onerous or the controversial.
Last year the CP announced a major reform - assuring that cases filed would be "registered" and therefore decided. It is part of the CPC's rule of law initiative to make courts more effective. The Supreme Peoples Court reports substantial progress since the May 2015 start date of the new system. - gwc
SPC reports on progress of China’s case registration and filing system[1]
The Fourth Plenary Session of the 18th CPC Central Committee put forward a reform on acceptance of cases using the case registration and filing system as a replacement for the existing case review and filing system; it also urged that all cases should be accepted and all litigation should be processed to guarantee the rights of litigants to appeal.
According to a resolution made at the 11th meeting of the central leading group for deepening overall reform on April 1, 2015, the new case-filing system was to take effect on May 1, 2015.
I. Brief introduction of the implementation of the system
On its implementation on May 1, the channels for case registration were opened to the public and the new system has operated well in courts across China. As of Sept 30, more than 6.2 million cases of first instance have been registered, up 31.9 percent from a year earlier.
The year-on-year growth rates of civil cases, administrative cases and criminal cases of private prosecution were 22.9 percent, 75.8 percent and 60.5 percent, respectively.
Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Shandong, and Guangdong are the provinces with the most registered cases in China, including 608,000 cases in Jiangsu and 558,000 cases in Guangdong.
The SPC accepted a total of 6,852 new cases, up 58.39 percent year-on-year, during the Jan-Sept period and is expected to handle about 15,000 cases by year end.
A key reason for the sharp rise of registered cases in courts at all levels is the implementation of the system. This result shows that the reform on case-filing has won popular support and accords with people’s will, and that the courts have fulfilled their commitments of “all cases should be accepted and all litigation should be handled”. It also indicates that courts have completely solved the difficulty in case-filing, so that people feel more satisfied with the judicial reform, resulting in high praise from people of all walks of life. A lawyer from a court in Shenyang’s Huanggu district said the case registration and filing system is the most thorough and effective reform in the history of the people’s court.
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