Taiwan’s judicial system has some serious problems. Judges are often overworked, and it usually takes a long time for a verdict to be delivered. Worse, rulings are not necessarily fair and just.
The public thinks this is just how things are: Judges are to be involved in all criminal cases, but in my experience of participating in arbitral proceedings, civil cases involving arbitrators have quite a few merits.
First, they would save everyone’s time. Most arbitrators would spend 30 minutes discussing the case’s points of contention and how it would be evaluated before a court. Usually, an arbitral tribunal would begin on time. Each session would take one or two hours (or longer); the maximum number of people convened in an arbitral tribunal is eight. Combined with the time spent on deliberation and preparing a judgement, it would take the arbitrators about 30 hours to examine the case, and the case could be wrapped up within nine months.
For Taiwanese judges, this time frame is too demanding. If a judge had to spend 30 hours on a single case and pass a final judgement within nine months, the Taiwanese judicial system would be like a sweatshop. Judges would be constantly overworked, and would collapse one after another.
Second, cases can be processed more expeditiously if specific expertise and professionalism are provided, and arbitrators should serve that purpose.
When cases related to engineering projects are inspected, the court would usually ask an agency or organization to give expert testimony.
In the past, judges would cite directly from the testimony and make their final judgements, but this proceeding was rescinded by the Supreme Court. Later, expert witnesses would be called to testify and assist with judgements, but even so, the judges would often refer to expert testimony as it appeared on paper and rely entirely upon it.
To deal with the issue, a special unit of judiciaries with expertise in engineering was established in Taiwan, but the truth is that few judges could understand designs, network diagrams of construction procedures, critical path methods and cost analyses.
For instance, in inspecting a civil case related to the cost of renovating a private house’s floor, a judge must rely on expert testimony. It is simply impossible for judges to decide based on estimate sheets, but the cost of providing them with expert testimony would be much higher than directly renovating the floor. Consequently, people would prefer to employ the services of a specialist able to determine the source of a leak rather than leave everything to judges.
I once participated in a case in which the parties disagreed on the numbers involved in electrical and mechanical engineering projects. In court, because the arbitral tribunal chair was an engineering expert, professional calculation and clarification could be done on site. The plaintiff realized that he would lose the case and dismissed the action. For cases such as this, could judges tease things out by themselves without engineers?
Arbitrators appointed by either party might be partial to one side, but as long as the chair of an arbitral tribunal can remain independent and impartial, a single arbitrator would be unable to determine the outcome.
Overall, to solve the problems resulting from overworked judges, the law might be amended to include more professionals as citizen judges, including but not limited to attorneys, civil engineers, structural engineers, electrical and mechanical engineers. Cases distributed randomly to those who are equipped with the necessary expertise. In this way, the arbitration system could be improved, and the workload of judges can be reduced.
Hou Yung-fu is a retired lawyer.
Translated by Emma Liu
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