IN AN ARTICLE published in yesterday’s issue of the paper, an American mediation expert who has been working on various dispute resolution projects in Cyprus expressed his surprise at how little arbitration goes on here. Cypriots rarely settled their disputes through mediation or arbitration, said Edward J. Costello, who had been in Cyprus since January working on various dispute resolution projects.
His conclusion was that this was reflection of the high regard in which Cypriot judges and the justice system were held. People were prepared to wait for a few years to resolve their disputes in court rather than go to arbitration or mediation. Even in cases such as construction and insurance, which had arbitration clauses in the contracts, the two sides preferred to take their differences to court despite the long wait. Mediation and, as a last resort, arbitration are used only in the case of industrial disputes and are carried out by a specialist, Labour Ministry service.
While it true that Cypriot judges are trusted by the public, this is not the only reason people and businesses avoid arbitration. Taking a case to the court has a ridiculously low cost compared to other countries, and therefore even the most trivial disputes are settled by a judge. It is not unknown for money disputes involving a couple of hundred pounds to be taken to court. This is why the justice system is clogged up and there is a minimum two-year wait before a civil case is heard.
If the courts raised the cost of filing a suit to four or five thousand pounds, as opposed to the few pounds charged at present, much fewer people would take their disputes for trial. This would eliminate the two-year backlog, free judges from having to deal with trivial cases and greatly speed up the administering of justice.
It would also encourage people to honour the contracts they sign. At present, someone might refuse to make a payment and tell the beneficiary to take him to court, knowing that he would only have to make the payment after two or three years. He would lose, but because the cost of going to court is so low, it is a small price for delaying payment by a few years. If on the other hand, he had to pay court fees of a few thousand pounds, plus the applicant’s and his own legal fees, he would think twice about not making payment and allowing the case to go to trial.
In the end, only those who are pretty certain of winning a case would be taking disputes to court, while those in the wrong would be disinclined to go to trial because of the prohibitive cost of losing. Only then would individuals as well as businesses start to use the services of an arbitrator or mediator for dispute resolution and thus ease the backlog of the courts, which, as things are, works to the advantage of those who do not honour their contractual obligations.
