1. HWC - Brussels meeting Session 1
Classic methods for the evaluation of the quality of justice in Hungary – Matyas Bencze & Agnes Kovacs (University of Debrecen)

2. Main characteristics of selection and evaluation of judges in Hungary
Judicial S&E is a judicial business
External perspective is not incorporated in the S&E mechanism
Very detailed and objective S&E criteria
Balanced mix of objective and subjective elements in the S&E mechanism

3. Selection Previous external work experience  not required =>
Selection pool: court clerks (97%) internal career line
judge trainee court clerk district court judgehigher court judge
Crucial: admission test for court clerks
Competence and skill oriented test OK
But! possibility of skipping the admission test hiring as administrative employee with law degree)

4. Proportion of successful external/internal candidates
Year
Total number of applicants
Number of newly appointed judges
Number of successful “internal” candidates
Number of successful “external” candidates
2013
588 43 40 3
2014
508 67 66 1
2015
554 57 56
2016
559 59

5. Appointment to judgeship
No written or oral examination  scoring system
Objective elements:
List of achievements awarded (objective points)
Result of bar exam, job evaluation, service time, academic degree etc.
Physical and psychological assessment (not completely adequate)
Subjective elements (judges decide on who can be a judge)
Interview conducted by the local judicial council (subjective points)
Re-ranking the first three applicants by the president of court and the President of NOJ

6. Evaluation - promotion
Career line = going up in the hierarchy  reflected in the evaluation
(incompetent, competent, highly competent, and highly competent for a higher judicial position)
Objective elements:
very detailed assessment criteria (three aspects: quantitative, qualitative and judicial skills)
based on case files, judgement, quality of judicial writing, visiting court hearings, opinion of second instance panels, statistical data
Subjective elements
Evaluation by the immediate superior judge
Risks:
Fragmentation of the judicial practice
Incentive to align the judicial practice to the immediate higher courts (independence?)

7. Other quality-related developments
Practice-oriented compulsory training for clerks and junior judges (uniform)  mostly held by senior judges (including a course of judicial writing)
“instructor” judge for junior judges (one year, consultative function)
Postgraduate degree (specialization of judges)

8. Summary Quality is a judicial business
Quality of performance regarding individual judges are assessed and improved (almost) exclusively by other judges
Very few feedback from outside of the judiciary
Who is a high quality judge? – the one who meets the internal professional standards
Positive side: very detailed assessment criteria exist

9. Evaluation of courts – actors, aims
huge emphasis on the evaluation of courts’ activity
centralized process (NOJ – special model of court administration)
little external contribution (e.g. users’ perspective)
purpose:
meet strategic objectives (6 goals)
case and staff allocation (huge workload imbalances)
- no direct link between evaluation and (financial) resource allocation

10. Evaluation of courts – indicators
activity effectiveness („numbers”)
indicators (determined at the national level)
incoming cases
resolved cases
backlog („old” cases: pending over two years)
timeliness
workload (case/judge)
appeal rate/rate of quashed judgments („soundness of adjudication”)

11. Evaluation of courts – allocation of responsibility
responsibility: court presidents (disciplinary proceedings)
supervisor: President of the National Office for the Judiciary
 yearly court reports submitted to the NOJ
 annual reports by the President of the NOJ are published
a new trend:
- workload measurement

12. Evaluation of courts – workload measurement
aim: balanced workload (strategic goal)
tool: workload measurement
- establishing „case weights” for case allocation (within courts)
- „ratio tables” for staff allocation (incoming cases/judicial staff)

13. Evaluation of courts – conclusions
„STATISTICAL APPROACH”
one aspect of quality is mostly stressed
detailed statistics (reliability, comparability)
appeal rate – quality benchmark
highly centralized evaluation process

14. The „Debrecen Model” bottom-up initiative (3 pillars)
“combination of management tools, case distribution and motivation techniques”
introducing „case weights” (pioneer)
various management tools
 judicial independence (?)
motivational system (holidays)
success: cutting the backlog, timeliness (EFFECTIVENESS)
limits of nationwide implementation