Acta Universitatis Danubius. Juridica, Vol 7, No 1 (2011)

Abstract

In this paper we are trying to offer those practicing law a theoretical and practical approach of some dispositions in Law 202/ October 25, 2010 regarding some measures to accelerate the adjudication of matters, known as the Law on the Small Justice Reform, that amended and completed the Code of Civil Procedure. The law on accelerating justice was adopted only three months and 11 days after the New Code of Civil procedure was published. This law is important due to the content of some dispositions regarding certain institutions of civil procedural law, that have the role intended by the Romanian legislator, to accelerate the determination of matters, institutions that are not found in the New Code. The reform (change) in the Romanian civil trials took into consideration the respect of some principles such as the access to justice, equality of the parties in civil lawsuits, the right to due and fair trial as well as the fact that any reform has to guarantee that the judicial system is efficient, answers the necessity of transparency and democracy. Still, the application of the new dispositions of civil procedure, beginning with Law no. 59/1993 and until the coming into force of law on accelerating the determination of matters, namely the past 17 years, the amendments brought to the Code of Civil procedure have not always been beneficial for the Romanian litigant by the fact that they determined different interpretations leading thus to a non unitary judicial practice even within the same institution. The present law is not safe either from critics that some theoreticians and practitioners of law have expressed, being interested in accomplishing the purpose the Romanian legislator has set in that law. In this paper, the authors aim at analyzing the impact of the abovementioned law, regarding the material competence of the tribunal in trials and the requests regarding claims with the object of payment up to 2000 lei; adjudicating the objection to jurisdiction of the instance and the effect of non invocating it on legal basis; the solutions that the appeal court can issue. At the same time, without getting into theoretical disputes regarding these issues raised in this study (to avoid issuing decisions that could be given in applying the same norm of procedure, obviously with negative effect on the litigant parties), we will try to propose solutions in case they will be transposed into judicial norms of civil procedure (until the coming into force of the New Code of civil procedure) will have a positive effect in the accelerated development of the Romanian civil trial. We assert that “acceleration in adjudicating civil trials” should not remain a collocation empty of content and this is the reason for which the judicial norms of civil procedure have to be characterized by accuracy and flexibility in application, without the necessity of elaborating an application “guide”.