In recent years, statistics have recorded a significant increase in litigation. On the one hand, this circumstance can be regarded as evidence of an increase in the legal culture of the population: citizens allow the possibility of legal protection of their legitimate interests by contacting the relevant authorities. On the other hand, this leads to a significant increase in the volume of cases to be considered.
So, according to the Judicial Department of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, in 2006, 7 million 564 thousand civil cases were considered, and by 2010 their number had already reached 12 million 914 thousand. Currently, the number of controversial legal relations that are decided by judges continues to grow.
This trend is not only predictable and fully consistent with state policy to increase the legal culture and eliminate nihilism, statistics directly reflect the achievement of the goal - citizens' legal awareness is increasing every year. Therefore, the fact that the state is not ready for the proportionate growing burden of expanding the state of the courts remains inexplicable.
The result of an increase in the number of cases for each judge is a deterioration in the quality of consideration of each legal dispute. The desire to make a decision as quickly as possible is more than understandable, given the desire to meet the deadlines set by law and the pressure from the chairpersons distributing the load.
An increase in the number of judges, however, also does not seem to be an effective solution to the problem, since this will not affect the trend of an annual increase in the volume of civil cases.
Pre-trial dispute resolution can help reduce the burden
.Improving the mechanism for the peaceful resolution of conflicts and the voluntary performance of duties will positively affect economic activity and civil turnover in general.
For example, pre-trial settlement of tax disputes helps to solve most problems in this area. But in practice there are cases of incorrect fulfillment by the authorized bodies of their obligations. Pre-trial settlement of conflicts through the fault of certain officials may turn into an additional, often burdensome procedure for the party whose rights have been violated. But this problem can be solved by tightening the responsibility of regulatory authorities.
Pre-trial settlement will not allow, for example, unscrupulous insurance companies to violate the rights of their customers, forcing them to go to court to receive the insured amount of the established amount. In addition, it seems reasonable to introduce additional fines for abusive enterprises. Payment of expenses incurred in connection with the proceedings is not a substantial waste for an unscrupulous insurance company.
Pre-trial settlement of disputes as a legal institution has enormous potential. It can act as a means of unloading ships and is a method of supporting the formation of civil society. Thus, pre-trial settlement is a mechanism that contributes to the establishment of a rule of law.