The Council of Ministers has approved the referral to the Courts of the Draft Laws on Organizational Efficiency and Procedural Efficiency of the Public Justice Service. Both regulations, together with the future Digital Efficiency Law, constitute the pillars of the Justice 2030 Plan.
According to the Government itself, the Procedural Efficiency Law aims to streamline Justice activity in structural terms, facilitate social cohesion and contribute to the sustainability of the system.
The Minister of Justice, Pilar Llop, has influenced in which the appropriate means for the resolution of disputes will be introduced. The parties in conflict may go in good faith to resolve the dispute within their own capabilities or go with the intervention of a neutral third party. "Not only mediation will be expressly regulated, without conciliation, the confidential binding offer, the independent expert opinion and direct negotiation between the parties," Llop has advanced.
The measures contemplated in the norm, in the opinion of the minister, will help to decongest the courts and will be a negotiating and democratizing instrument: «The solutions will be much more adjusted to the needs of the parties, but also more flexible than what a sentence or a judicial resolution. As recognized in the Explanatory Memorandum, our country's Justice system has suffered from structural insufficiencies for decades, some of which are unjustified.
The public justice service must be able to offer citizens the most appropriate way to manage their problem. In some cases it will be the exclusively judicial route, but in many others it will be the consensual route that offers the best option. Choosing the most appropriate means of dispute resolution provides quality to Justice and brings satisfaction to citizens. In this context, the parties' reasons for building dialogue solutions in shared spaces become important.
Promote mediation in all its forms
Likewise, it is included in the Explanation of Reasons of the Bill on procedural efficiency measures of the public service of Justice., the need to recover the negotiating capacity of the parties, with the introduction of mechanisms that break the dynamics of confrontation and tension that invades social relations in our times. To achieve this, it is necessary to introduce effective measures that do not degrade or transform into mere bureaucratic requirements. To this end, mediation in all its forms must be promoted and other mechanisms with proven experience in comparative law must be introduced.
Thus, this law contains an entire Title I dedicated to the regulation of the appropriate means of resolving disputes through non-jurisdictional means, which begins with general provisions relating to their concept, characterization and scope of application, and continues with your configuration like procedural requirement, generally in the civil jurisdictional order, prior to judicial proceedings.
Law 5/2012, of July 6, on mediation in civil and commercial matters, is modified by the Draft Law on procedural efficiency measures of the public service of Justice, in different aspects, among others the effects of mediation on the prescription and expiration periods, its connection with the procedural requirement established in the Civil Procedure Code, the requirements that must be met for this, the harmonization of the confidentiality requirement with the regulation contained in title I for the remaining appropriate means of non-jurisdictional dispute resolution, legal assistance, the initial session, the constitutive session and intrajudicial referral.
Another change to take into account in relation to civil liability in matters of traffic accidents is the modification of Law 35/2006, of November 28, on Personal Income Tax and partial modification of the laws. of Corporate Taxes, Non-Resident Income Taxes and Property Taxes. This way, The exemption provided for in said Tax for compensation as a consequence of civil liability for personal injuries in the legally or judicially recognized amount is reviewed, with the purpose that it may be applicable when, without fixing its legal or judicial amount, the compensation is paid by the insurance company of the cause of physical or mental damage in compliance with a mediation agreement or any other appropriate means of legally provided dispute resolution.
In short, all these reforms, which we will talk a lot about in the increasingly near future, demonstrate the commitment of public institutions to carry out the actions that are necessary to promote the culture of mediation. thus following the path marked by the Council of Europe and expanding the use of this instrument to the civil and commercial sphere to continue advancing to achieve a society in which the use of mediation as a means for the extrajudicial resolution of conflicts in the civil and commercial sphere commercial system has the maximum legal guarantee and security and its implementation is a reflection of the rule of law and the democratic principles of our society and our system.
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