The new Law on Measures for Procedural Facilitation was passed by the Congress the last 22nd September 2011 and published in the Official State Bulletin (BOE) the 11th October 2011. The said Laws will come on effect 20 days after the publication in the BOE and will introduce new modifications in the contentious-administrative jurisdiction field.
The most important measures in this matter are the following:
- Will be subject of appeal those judgments exceeding 30.000€. The amount fixed before this Law was established on 18.000€
- After the entry into force of the Law, the shortened procedure will cover any other procedures not exceeding 30.000€. Before the establishment of this Law, the amount fixed for shortened procedures was 13.000€
- The access to the extraordinary appeal on points of law pending before the Supreme Court is limited for all those judgments not exceeding 600.000€. Except for those special proceedings that defend the human rights. Equally the access to extraordinary appeal on points of law for the case-law unification it is limited to those proceedings exceeding 30.000€ instead of the 18.000€ fixed before.
- The previous general appearance in procedures for urgent interim reliefs are ruled out for those cases in which the Judge considers there is not urgency.
- With the implementation of this Law the attorney’s fees will be awarded by the loosing part except for those cases in which the Judge considers there are doubts of facto or by law.
- Other measurements have been taken in order to solve the problem of stagnation that we can find today in Courts.
Once the Law entries into force after its publication in the BOE the opened proceedings in whatever instance will continue as stipulated by the previous procedural law.
Once that we have seen that the principal objective of the new Law is not other than try to speed up all legal proceedings, we can say, or at least many professional of the administrative law field think, that this is not the best measure since it restricts the litigant’s rights by increasing the amounts in second instance and in extraordinary appeals. Likewise, we consider excessive the implementation of the general rule in the imposition of costs. Nevertheless these measurements have been already approved and with instant effect, and we consider them important to be known for all those who are going to initiate or pretend to initiate a legal proceeding against the Public Administration.
