independent adjudication can be delivered in new and different ways without
interference with fundamental integrity.
Finally, in all of this there are the problems associated with the cost of going to law.
For general middle-class New Zealanders the legal system is off-bounds. I know the
same to be true here also. Those who can get legal aid are mostly well served by
dedicated women and men. But the Law Commission in New Zealand for example
frequently found that people with their hands on the levers in the Court system would
say that a case involving less than $50,000 is not worth litigating. But, like the woman
who challenged me over the $7000, what have we got wrong that an amount which is
about double the annual income of the average New Zealander is too insignificant to be
able to involve the third arm of government in providing resolution.
Reducing costs for participants in the court system was probably the major issue for lay
submitters to our review of courts, and the number of lay people who made submissions
was unprecedented. It was an issue we had to confront. We concluded that costs can
only be permanently and significantly
r
educed by an ongoing and united focus by
government, the judiciary and the profession on the kind of measures I have already
discussed - those that promote easily accessible and streamlined processes both in and
out of court.
Well, what possibilities are available? First and foremost I think that in all proceedings
we need a change of culture so that the starting point is - what is the optimum outcome
for each client? What is the way forward in respect of people who are going to have a
future, and some times a relationship future, beyond the courthouse and its adjudication?