Private curators can now arrange court cases digitally
In the future, curators will be able to provide information digitally to courts. Private curators can now also submit cases to the court via a web portal, so that they do not have to physically travel to a court.
Professional curators can link their networks to the systems of the judiciary. There is a web portal for private curators, who, for example, arrange matters for friends or family. That’s called My Reign, writes the Judiciary. Users must log in with DigiD and can then view files, complete them digitally and submit them to the court. They also receive messages in the portal about changes in files.
Courts will gradually invite private curators to use the portal. This is not mandatory; they can also go to court itself. An information session is available for participants that allows users to: the portal can get to know. It is possible to use one portal with different curators.
New step in digitalization
It is a new step that the Judiciary is taking towards digitization. Previously, curators had to physically go to a specific court if they wanted to adjust files, which could cost a lot of time and money. In recent years, the Judiciary has set up more and more initiatives to make going to court easier for citizens. This took off during the corona crisis, when legal cases could suddenly only take place online. Courts initially used a Cisco tool for this, but since the corona crisis, Skype has been used frequently. At the end of 2021, the Judiciary decided to switch to Microsoft Teams, which was more user-friendly for citizens. The Judiciary considered this such a great success that the Council for the Judiciary argued in favor of continuing to make online justice possible after the corona crisis.
During the corona crisis, courts started organizing hearings online. Not only Covid-19 made the Judiciary want to become more digital. That has been an aspiration for some time. By mid-2021, the Council of the Judiciary said it wanted to put about three-quarters of the judgments online. During that period, this only happened with about five percent of the one and a half million statements made annually. That wish may be there, but in practice it is difficult. Judgments must be anonymized and it takes a lot of time to do this manually. That is why the Council for the Judiciary is currently looking at automating that process. Another factor is that judges have to write judgments differently.
Government wish
The desire for digitization of the Judiciary also comes from The Hague. The government already agreed in the coalition agreement that there should be ‘a broad multi-year cybersecurity approach and cyber expertise in the Judiciary’. Money was made available for this. In July 2022, the government decided to give the Judiciary 155 million euros per year to digitize. The coalition agreement stated that the Judiciary and the Public Prosecution Service together receive 200 million euros per year. The money is intended to ‘invest heavily in making the Judiciary more accessible digitally’. The portal for private curators is an unmistakable part of this, just like previous initiatives to replace the fax with Secure Mail, for example.