NCJ Number
216259
Date Published
2006
Length
167 pages
Annotation
This report presents the results of a comparative study of the court fee systems in member states of the European Union.
Abstract
Findings on the court fees in 18 countries indicated that the highest court fee rates were charged in Estonia, the Netherlands, and Germany. Spain, France, and Luxemburg charge no court fees due to their belief that access to justice should be free of charge. The in-depth analysis of the court fee systems in Denmark, Germany, England and Wales, and Scotland revealed that for each country, court fees are associated with the overall costs of procedures for the litigant parties and the cost of the judicial system. While none of the countries impose court fees that would infringe on access to justice, Denmark recently limited its court fee rates. The systems of all four countries also allow for exemptions or reductions in fees for people with limited resources. The report also provides a discussion of the features of court fee systems, which include the way court fees have been used as an instrument of judicial policy. Comparisons of the four court fee systems with the Dutch court fee system revealed that the Dutch system was not consistent with the common practice of these other countries. The Netherlands was the only country not to use court fees to influence procedural choices made by the litigant parties and was the only country that had failed to develop a unified system for court fees in civil and administrative cases. The analysis was confined to any contribution asked by government in exchange for services in the domains of civil or administrative procedures; criminal cases were not considered. The analysis of entire court fee systems was limited to 4 states--Denmark, Germany, England and Wales, and Scotland--while the height of the court fees were reviewed for 18 countries. Footnotes, tables, references, appendixes