‘Judiciary in the Cabinet’ can also widen the gap with the citizen

Do you ever doubt whether you should see a lawyer? If the landlord does not resolve the leakage, Youth Care announces a family visit after the Halt sentence for the dear son, your employment contract will not be renewed? And who is your lawyer – is that an insurer, the lawyer on the corner or does the neighbor who works at the municipality know someone?

Access to justice is a puzzle for everyone – and the internet hasn’t helped much yet. At least, if I’m in doubt whether I should go to the doctor, I open ‘app de nurse’ on my phone, answer some factual questions and within an hour I have a recommendation from a doctor, chosen by my insurer. Open seven days a week and in the evenings. As a spoiled digi-citizen, I’m not even surprised about that.

But that is not the case for ‘the right’. er does right-hander exist, a kind of legal first aid in case of dismissal, debts, divorce, purchase and assistance. And there are legal entrepreneurs who are happy to object digitally for a fee against your parking fine or WOZ assessment. But the law is complex and the services provided are very fragmented. And the legal counselor is afraid of cold feet. At least that’s what I sniffed at the UvA symposium ‘Towards a digitization of social legal services’ last week. Would such an ‘app de lawyer’ service? up to date to be? And should such technology be aimed at the citizen or at the care provider? Or on both? The latter, I’d say.

By the way, I also laughed there, and not the only one, then keynote speaker Prof. Dame Hazel Genn via Zoom from London a Youtube video showed how the British judiciary prepares its citizens for digital law via the laptop. Genn is an expert in ‘access to justice’ for average citizens – her target group is the bottom of society. Badly housed, unhealthy, broke, half illiterate, no mobile phone or tablet, let alone wifi or calling credit.

The film instructs the summoned citizen to find a quiet place in the house, preferably with a WiFi cable, a charged telephone, tablet or laptop, a headset, at a table with all paperwork within reach. And whether the housemates want to switch off their connections. Now the British underclass is, in my opinion, even poorer than the Dutch, so all this was middle class fiction. Her clients, thus informed, would not appear digitally, she thought. What is needed to give semi-illiterate laptop-less citizens without 4G digital access to justice are public video cells in city halls, community centers and libraries. With headphones, camera, screen. Lockable and bookable.

Wait a second! They already exist. The national police have 34 unmanned ‘3D declaration counters’ from Zeeland to Noord-Holland at public locations, for direct video contact with the government. Homework for the Ministry of Justice and Security: please extend it to the entire administration of justice, not just declarations.

Now the United Kingdom is further ahead with digital justice than the Netherlands. Since 2016, it has been on its way to 4 million digital cases per year, compared to 1.8 million in the Netherlands – over nine years. I also suspect that there have been severe cutbacks in the past ten years, both on the administration of justice and legal aid. The judiciary had to surrender 34 percent. This has given digitization the wind in its sails, after which the pandemic added to it.

British case law has such a fifteen instructional videos stand for (digital) court appearances† With subtitles in Urdu, Welsh or Sign Language. Genn already had a few „lessons learned” finished. The video technology offered must be of high quality in order to achieve procedural justice for citizens. Communication between lawyers and clients during video sessions appears to be problematic. Judges and lawyers have to adapt their communication style. And not all citizens are video proof. Think of people with problems in appearance, behavior, character – for whom this ultramodern ‘straight in the closet’ is a totally alienating experience. Digitization of law can therefore also increase the gap with the citizen instead of narrowing it.