The head of Civil Justice has said in a speech for International Disputes Week, according to the Law Society Gazette, that ‘The new generations will demand that justice, like everything else, is delivered at proportionate cost online,’ said Vos, who described the current processes for dispute resolution as ‘cumbersome and expensive’.
‘Lawyers, judges and arbitrators will need quickly to acquire a comprehensive understanding of how these [new] technologies work. A paper-based process will simply not be satisfactory in the new era,’ he said.
He said that online dispute resolution had so far been largely limited to small claims, but this will change dramatically as most cases of all sizes are resolved online long before coming to court or requiring a judicial decision. He told the audience that business and property courts would be included in any digital overhaul.
Vos said the online dispute resolution system he envisaged would have advantages for lawyers and litigants alike – hugely increasing access to justice and increasing confidence in the England and Wales legal system, but also allowing solicitors and barristers to concentrate on the cases that are not straightforward or capable of being resolved online.
‘Lawyers will continue to earn good fees where they add value,’ said Vos.
Revealing new details of his vision for an online ‘funnel’ for civil claims, Sir Geoffrey said the ‘harmonised’ system would incorporate 30-40 existing dispute resolution portals run by ombudsman schemes and the like. These would be regulated and accredited by the government with a ‘blue tick’ scheme and create consistent data sets to feed in to the central online court system in the event of a dispute not being settled at the pre-court stage.