On 10 June 2011, the Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Development presented its budget vote speech to Parliament. The Ministry advised that improved Access to Justice remains its primary focus. For this reason, 70% of the department’s budget is dedicated to service delivery programmes to ensure that services are within reach of the communities, especially those in rural and under developed areas.

Additional courts will be built and existing one’s refurbished in accordance with the long term objective of ensuring a “Lower Court for Every Municipality or District Municipality.” This will be realised through the building of new courts in areas such as the Bitou municipality as well as upgrading Branch Courts into full service courts. Branch courts are predominantly found in Black townships and rural areas. Transforming these courts into full service courts means that they become self standing and provide all services, including civil and family law services to local communities compared to the limited services related to criminal trials provided by the Branch Courts.

In addition to the transformation of the Brach Courts, the previous 61 Black Divorce Courts have been transformed by the Regional Court Act, 2008 into full fledged courts capable of hearing civil disputes, including divorce and family disputes – thereby bringing services closer to where litigants live. These courts are predominantly in former Black areas and rural villages.

Small Claims Courts are to be established in all 384 magisterial districts. In 2010, 26 new Small Claims Courts were established, mostly in rural areas.

All Magistrates’ Courts are now Equality Courts.

Backlog courts have been established to deal with backlogs clogging up the administration of justice.

An Access to Justice Conference will take place from 7 to 11 July 2011.07.02

Some of the highlighted budget allocations include the following:

• Over the next 3 years R2,5-billion will be spent on the building of courts and other infrastructure projects.
• R225- million has been set aside for the reduction in criminal case backlogs in regional and district courts.
• R86- million, R202-million and R214-million has been allocated over the next three years for the implementation of the Children’s Act, the Child Justice Act and the Sexual Offences Act.
• R13-million will be spent to appoint 65 additional Maintenance Investigators
• R17,4-million will be spent on Children’s Court Clerks
• R12-million for 111 new Child Justice Court Clerks
• R40-million for Legal Aid South Africa’s candidate attorneys.

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Click here to view the Justice department’s budget vote speech.