SENATE ADOPTS BILL INCREASING JURISDICTIONAL AMOUNTS

The Philippine Senate adopted on Monday Senate Bill No. 1886 that targets to help de-clog the dockets and speed up the disposition of cases of the second level courts and first level courts by expanding the jurisdictional threshold.

"We are in an era where justice has crawled so slowly. The last time we amended the jurisdictional threshold or amounts was in 2004, which meant there are a lot of people who have waited for their cases to be called. If we bring down the load of second level courts and give some to first level courts, the process of law will be faster," Senator Richard J. Gordon, author of SB 1886, said during the period of amendments for the bill."

According to the Office of the Court Administrator of the Supreme Court, there are 21,269 pending civil cases at the first level courts (Municipal Trial Courts, Metropolitan Trial Courts, Municipal Circuit Trial Courts, Municipal Trial Courts in Cities), while there are 108,484 pending civil cases at the second level courts (Regional Trial Courts) as of December 2018.

Gordon pointed out that raising the jurisdictional threshold of second level and first level courts will equalize the burden between both court levels, and thus, will address the delay in the disposition cases due to overloading of cases assigned per judge.

"The phase of justice is turning slow. My personal thrust is to make sure that the Justice Committee comes out with things that will speed up the administration of justice. The thrust therefore is to see to it that the people become more aware of the fleet-footedness of the judiciary," he said.

To help advance the country's justice system, Gordon previously passed the Judges-at-Large Act of 2018 or R.A. 11459 that would address the increasing number of pending trials in courts and to solve the congestion of court dockets through the creation of 100 regional trial court judges-at-large positions and 50 municipal trial court positions.

The Community Service Act or R.A. 11362 that will allow the courts to impose community service in lieu of imprisonment for minor offenses, which will promote restorative justice and jail decongestion, was likewise passed in 2019.

"The important thing is we allow ourselves to require direct and efficacious solutions in a very expeditious manner. This is the body and soul of this bill. I think it's important that we act fast," said Gordon

SBN 1886 is a consolidated measure of SBN 1359 filed by Gordon on February 18, 2020 and SBN 1353 filed by Senators Emmanuel D. Pacquiao and Manuel M. Lapid on February 17, 2020.