The justice minister said this Wednesday that talks with the bailiffs are continuing “in the direction of mutual understanding,” awaiting within “the coming weeks” a “formal proposal” for a new professional charter.
Catarina Sarmento y Castro spoke before the Parliamentary Committee on Constitutional Affairs, Rights, Freedoms and Guarantees during a regimental hearing in which she responded, among other things, to the status of negotiations with judicial officials who are conducting various forms of strike action. From January.
The minister assured that two expectations have already been met in relation to the requirements of judicial officials: the strengthening of the staff (another 200 employees) and the permission for 561 promotions in this professional class. Earlier in her initial speech to a parliamentary commission, the minister reiterated that “2023 is the year of bailiffs.”
Regarding the criticism from all opposition and trade unions for not responding to the requirement to include a procedural reinstatement allowance in the salaries of judiciaries, Catarina Sarmento e Castro recalled that this situation had already been discussed in the previous government and that trade unions did not accept this offer.
“The fact that they are asking me to stop the strike today was what the previous minister suggested, and the unions didn’t want to,” he replied, emphasizing the government’s “goodwill” in the negotiation process and adding: the plan is to get approval statute, and we took several steps to get the bailiffs to end the strike.”
Faced with the critical situation of young people interned in educational centres, SDF Catarina Sarmento e Castro responded that there had been a “strengthening of human resources”, recalling that 105 social reintegration specialists had entered the educational centres.
The Minister referred to the fact that in this and other areas, whether it be prison guards, the National Institute of Forensic Medicine or the recruitment of personnel for electronic surveillance and domestic violence, “the path is being paved”, along with the launch of work either in the judicial Police facilities (PJ), whether either in courts or prisons.
Cheg’s deputy Pedro Pinto criticized the minister for repeatedly using the term “make it possible” when instead she should have said “we’ve already done it” when taking the opportunity to read the Porto District Attorney’s report. which reports on the “disinvestment” and “forgetting” of justice in Portugal, citing a shortage of 400 judicial officers in the public ministry, as well as a shortage of prosecutors and the slowness of computer systems.
The MP asked the minister if she would resign after this “gloomy report” on the justice situation, and Catarina Sarmento i Castro countered that the “internet bandwidth” that serves the courts had “tripled” and that several improvements were being made in various courts and institutions of the judicial police.
However, he acknowledged that his ministry “can’t be everywhere at the same time” but that a lot has been done at a time when “thousands of computers will arrive in the courts.”
Regarding the shortage of magistrates, the minister indicated that the Center for Judicial Studies had a maximum capacity of 135 trainees, so her ministry decided to set up a training center for new magistrates in Vila do Conde.
Author: Portuguese
Source: CM Jornal
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