The Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe (CCBE) expressed its concern on Wednesday 24 June about the very patchy reactivation of judicial systems in the EU, which have been paralysed due to the containment measures taken to combat the Covid-19 pandemic.
The organisation has indeed found that measures to reactivate the judicial system are not only different from one country to another, but also within the same country, on a regional basis, for example.
“By highlighting this issue, the CCBE wants to raise awareness among national authorities of different countries on how problematic and unacceptable such diversity of measures is from a fundamental rights perspective, especially when it comes to equal treatment of citizens”, it says.
The CCBE also believes that it is important to prepare urgently for a possible second wave or similar crisis in the future. “The whole justice system must adapt to the problems raised by the Covid-19 crisis - lawyers included”, the organisation writes.
The legal profession needs to prepare itself better, for example by changing certain working habits through greater use of online tools, but more coherent approaches are also needed at the national and European level, it stresses. In particular, the CCBE is of the opinion that lawyers should be recognised as essential workers in the event of a crisis.
See the statement: https://bit.ly/3eymnYn (Original version in French by Marion Fontana)