Scrutiny of individual judges ‘not fair’, legal groups say

In the Victorian Bar’s recent InBrief to members, vice president Fiona Ryan SC said that while courts were not above scrutiny, “we were particularly concerned by the singling out of individual judges in reporting on statistics referable to the delivery of judgments”.

“It is generally unhelpful to compare average judgment times in complex multi-party group proceedings with some other kinds of disputes of differing character and complexity,” Ryan said.

In a media statement, the Victorian Bar said that while it may have been tempting to focus on statistics, they “never tell the whole story”.

In addition to managing scarce resources, the Victorian Supreme Court has become the primary jurisdiction for class action litigation, which is often factually dense, complex, and costly to supervise.

Currently, there are 60 group proceedings on foot.

“Statistics, without context, do not present a balanced picture of the work of the court and the demands on its judges,” the Bar said.

VIEW ALL

The Commercial Bar added that in recent years, the Supreme Court’s commercial judges have had to handle this immense pressure when it has been short-staffed by at least two judges, due to the state government’s failure to replace retiring judges in a timely manner.

By singling out particular judges on the basis of data alone, the article did not “reliably illuminate the issue, nor was it fair”.

“Qualitative considerations, which are sometimes overlooked by empirical analysis alone, can offer a different perspective.

“Further, to adopt a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach to data analysis of cases decided by individual judges ignores the obvious fact that some cases are more simple and straightforward to decide than others,” it said.