After three rounds of deliberations, the Standing Committee of the 11th National People’s Congress adopted, with 140 legislators voting for, two against and one abstained, the amendments to the Civil Procedure Law, which was first promulgated in 1982.
Ranging from public litigations, small claims to supervision of civil procedure and conciliation, the 80-or-so amendments cover nearly all the aspects of civil procedure and execution.
The amendments are focused on the protection of citizen’s civil litigation rights, improvement of efficiency and pay more attention to people’s interest, legal experts noted.Chinahas entered a transition period and will inevitably see mountains of social conflicts. Through legislation, the legislature department will play a key role in maintaining economic and social order with the aim to guarantee citizen’s litigation rights and ensure people’s court’s trials timely.
Safeguarding litigation rights
Since the first amendment 21 years ago, the law has been revised several times with the aim to lay restraints in court and safeguard the litigation rights among citizens.
The latest revision was no exception, said Tang Weijian, a law professor from Renmin University of China, who had attended the discussion on the amendments. He noted the amendments stress the establishment of public interest litigation system, guarantee the litigations rights of citizens and enlarge the scope of agreed jurisdiction.
InChina, the frequent occurrence of severe accidents in the field of environmental protection and food safety ushered the establishment of public interest litigation system as early as possible.
For any act that has polluted environment, or infringed upon the civil rights and interests of consumers, a State organ or relevant organization may bring an action in a people’s court, stipulates the newly revised law.
“The public interest litigation system is a smart decision in line with the social concern and people’s will,” said NPC Standing Committee member Chen Xiurong. Based on this article, infringers will be pursued their responsibility. It is a progress that the law has strengthened the litigation rights of the plaintiffs, Chen noted.
To safeguard the litigation rights is the first step to ensure the parties access the court and seek judicial assistance; meanwhile, it has been a chronicle complaint among the people to bring a lawsuit.
For example, some courts choose neither to file a case nor to make a verdict after receiving a lawsuit, said Tang, adding that such practice is a convert act of exploiting the parties’ litigation and appealing rights and dampens the belief of the judicial system among the ordinary people.
To seek a way out, the amended law stipulates that the people’s courts shall guarantee the parties to enjoy the legal rights of litigation.
Moreover, the law rules that people’s procuratorates at all levels have the right to supervise the unlawful acts of the judges committed during the trials, either in or out of court. Such a provision ensures the procuratorate could play the role in maintaining the parties’ litigation rights, note Tang.
Another breakthrough during the revision is to enlarge the scale of agreed jurisdiction. The original law stipulates that “A lawsuit brought on a contract dispute shall be under the jurisdiction of the people’s court of the place where the defendant has his domicile or where the contract is performed.” The amended law enlarges the scale of courts that all the parties involved to a contract can choose any court that excises a de facto jurisdiction to the case.
Such a revision illustrates the respects toward the parties to a contract, Tang said.
During the cross-examinations, the revised law stipulates that “witnesses, in principle, should appear in court; the department authorized by the law for evaluation and the experts designated by the department should, if needed, appear in court. Otherwise the testimony, evaluation conclusion cannot be regarded as the evidence to the verdict.” Tang hailed the revision as a measure to better protect the parties’ rights to provide evidence and cross-examine.
With the aim to curb judicial corruption, the revised law rules that the judgments and written orders should make clear the results and their reasons. It also adds that ordinary people have the right to look up the judgments and written orders that have taken effect.
NPC deputy Chen Xiurong said the new law has provided an open, transparent and smooth channel for the parties, as well as promoted the fair trial by the people’s court.
Enhancing legal supervision
Before revision, the Civil Procedure Law gives the procuratorates limited supervision, some kind of subsequent supervision only after the judgment has taken effect. Such kind of legal supervision has proved futile when dealing with the eye-catching difficulties during the execution.
Moreover, a supervision vacuum has existed for quite a long time on the conciliation activities by the people’s court because there lacks relevant laws in this regard.
“Where there is judgment, there is supervision. Otherwise, an absolute judgment right could inevitably lead to corruption,” said Tang, adding that a highlight of the amendments is to enhance supervision by the procuratorates.
“Different from the past, the supervision of the procuratorates has extended from trials to the execution of judgment,” he added.
“The amendments stipulate the scope, methods and means of supervision by the procuratorates, marking a big stride,” said Wang Shengming, a senior legislator from the NPC Standing Committee.
At the same time, the amendments make clear the conditions that the parties apply a supervision suggestion or lodge a protest against court judgments towards the people’s procuratorates.
The original law makes no clear stipulation that either the court or procuratorate the parties should appeal for when lodging a protest toward a judgment or written order that has taken effect. Wang noted the loopholes in the law might harm the rights of the parties or lead to waste of judicial resources.
The revised law protrudes the supervision of the procuratorates, which conforms to the duty of the procuratorates in correcting the unlawful judgments or written orders issued by the courts, Wang noted.
Improving litigation efficiency
During the social transition, there is a boom of lawsuits. NPC Standing Committee member Gong Xueping said the grass-roots courts cannot handle the rapid growth of civil cases, due to the economic development and the increase of legal awareness among the people. Such a situation has deterred the efficiency and caused great influences towards the legal rights of the ordinary people.
Another improvement of the amended law lies in the simplification of the litigation procedures in order to improve the legal efficiency, which is important to the realization of fairness.
It adds new provisions on the handling of small claims or other simple and evident civil cases in a simplified way – the result of the first instance trial as the final judgment.
The introduction of procedure for small claims will speed up the dealing with trivial cases in a more convenient and effective way, said Gong. It will help save judicial resources as well as human power of the courts.
Tang echoed Gong’s opinions, saying the exorbitant expense on litigation may flinch some of the parties to give up their lawsuits. The establishment of small claims procedure helps protect the civil litigation rights of the people.
Handling the cases where they belong to
With the increase of civil disputes nowadays, conciliation has become an important method in defusing conflicts from deterioration. Meanwhile, the courts are not enough in dealing with all the disputes.
According to the law, in the trial of civil cases, the people’s court shall distinguish between right and wrong on the basis of the facts being clear and conduct conciliation between the parties on a voluntary basis. In the year 2004, the Supreme People’s Court publicized a regulation on conciliation of civil cases and achieved satisfactory results.
According to the revised law, a people’s court is suggested to conduct conciliation in handling civil cases if they fit for conciliation; meanwhile, no conciliation will be organized if the parties refused.
The revised provision sets up a conciliation-first mechanism when dealing with a civil case before setting up a file by the court, said Tang, adding the law has strengthened the function of conciliation.
Jurisdiction is always regarded as the final resort when dealing with a conflict. Conciliation as well as other measures could be chosen, which would help avoid the waste of judicial resources, said NPC Standing Committee member Gu Shengzu.
In Tang Weijian’s opinion, the conciliation-first mechanism illustrates the adjustment between judgment and conciliation, which is a natural fruit of judicial practice. Being a conflict-resolving mechanism, conciliation is of Chinese characteristics and was introduced first into the Civil Procedure Law in 1982 but got weakened during the revision in 1991.
The revised law stresses and legalizes the balance of conciliations in and out of court. “Such a revision indicates the changes of the time in handling civil conflicts,” said Tang Weijian. Such mechanism will give a big say to social institutes and non-governmental organizations.
The procedural linkage between the Civil Procedure Law and People’s Conciliation Law helps resolve the increasing conflicts in a rational, fair and candid way, noted Tang. (NPC)
CFP
The 28th session of the 11th NPC Standing Committee approves the draft amendment to the Civil Procedure Law on August 31.Ren Chenming