Resolving delays in procedures for requesting the appointment of judicial experts

Research and propose the development of legal documents regulating the provision of out-of-court appraisal services

Briefly presenting the Draft Law on Judicial Expertise (amended), Minister of Justice Nguyen Hai Ninh said that the draft Law maintains the scope of regulation of the current Law on Judicial Expertise. The subjects of application of the Law on Judicial Expertise (amended) are individuals, organizations, and agencies related to judicial expertise activities. The draft Law consists of 6 chapters and 45 articles.

Minister of Justice Nguyen Hai Ninh briefly presented the Draft Law on Judicial Expertise (amended). Photo: Quang Khanh

According to Minister Nguyen Hai Ninh, the draft Law consists of 6 chapters and 45 articles. Specifically, it is proposed to keep 3 articles; amend and supplement 34 articles; supplement 9 articles; remove 11 articles and 1 clause (clause 4, Article 22) of the current Law on Judicial Expertise. Therefore, based on the provisions of Point b, Clause 4, Article 8 of the Law on Promulgation of Legal Documents 2025, the Government proposes to develop a draft Law on Judicial Expertise (amended).

The Draft Law supplements regulations on technology application and digital transformation, including: building, managing, operating, and exploiting a database on forensic expertise with connectivity and data sharing; sending dossiers of requests for forensic expertise in electronic documents; using digital signatures in forensic expertise conclusions; and storing forensic expertise records electronically.

In addition, it is proposed to remove 11 articles and 1 clause in 1 article of the current Law on Judicial Expertise, including contents related to records, procedures, administrative procedures in state management of judicial expertise, tasks and powers of ministries, ministerial-level agencies, government agencies, People's Committees of provinces and cities in judicial expertise work to assign the Government to regulate.

Chairman of the Law and Justice Committee Hoang Thanh Tung presents the Report on the review of the draft Law. Photo: Quang Khanh

The report on the review of the draft Law was presented by Chairman of the Committee on Law and Justice Hoang Thanh Tung. Accordingly, the Committee basically agreed with the scope of amendments to the draft Law as submitted by the Government.

However, the addition of provisions on extrajudicial appraisal activities as in Articles 7, 16, 21 and 40 leads to the expansion of the scope of regulation of the Law. Therefore, it is recommended that the Government direct research to propose the development of a comprehensive legal document to regulate the provision of extrajudicial appraisal services.

Regarding the authority to appoint and dismiss judicial experts (Article 11), the majority of opinions in the Committee on Law and Justice agreed with the amended content of the draft Law to overcome the situation where the agency managing, using, supervising and evaluating the performance of duties of judicial experts does not have the authority to appoint and dismiss; at the same time, to resolve the delay in the procedure for requesting the appointment of judicial experts...

In addition, there are opinions suggesting to maintain the authority to appoint judicial experts as in the current Law in order to be consistent with the state management authority in each field and to ensure centralized and unified management of expertise.

Ensuring the feasibility of regulations on socialization of civil enforcement activities

Briefly presenting the Draft Law on Civil Judgment Enforcement (amended), Minister of Justice Nguyen Hai Ninh said that the draft Law consists of 5 Chapters and 118 articles (reducing 4 Chapters, removing 30 articles, keeping 16 articles, amending and consolidating 134 articles into 84 articles; adding 18 new articles compared to the current Law on Civil Judgment Enforcement).

The Draft Law supplements 18 articles including: articles on principles, prohibited acts, ensuring civil judgment enforcement activities, civil judgment enforcement management agencies, civil judgment enforcement agencies, a number of articles on judgment enforcement procedures and articles on civil judgment enforcement offices and enforcement officers. In particular, the provisions on civil judgment enforcement offices and enforcement officers are important contents, demonstrating strong innovation in civil judgment enforcement work according to the policy of socializing a number of civil judgment enforcement activities in Resolution No. 49-NQ/TW dated June 2, 2005 of the Politburo, Resolution No. 27-NQ/TW dated November 9, 2022 of the Central Executive Committee.

Delegates attending the meeting. Photo: Quang Khanh

On that basis, the draft Law has devoted Section 2, Chapter II to regulate the Bailiffs and the Civil Judgment Enforcement Office. At the same time, the name of the Bailiff is changed to Bailiff and the name of the Bailiff Office is changed to the Civil Judgment Enforcement Office to ensure more popularity, easier to understand, consistent with the scope and nature of the civil judgment enforcement activities of this organization. The Civil Judgment Enforcement Office and the Bailiffs are still allowed to perform other activities as prescribed by current regulations on Bailiffs.

The Draft Law also stipulates transitional provisions for the organization and operation of Bailiffs to ensure that the name change does not affect the operations of Bailiffs' offices and does not incur related costs.

Examining this content, Chairman of the Law and Justice Committee Hoang Thanh Tung stated that the Committee agrees with the scope of amendments to the draft Law as proposed by the Government.

Regarding the Civil Judgment Enforcement Office and the Bailiff (Section 2, Chapter II), the Committee basically agreed to legalize this institution (currently called Bailiff). However, it was found that according to the draft Law, the Bailiff is not allowed to apply some important measures to ensure the enforcement of judgments (such as temporary detention of assets, documents, temporary suspension of exit) and is not allowed to apply measures to enforce judgments, leading to not fully ensuring the conditions to perform the task of organizing the enforcement of civil judgments, which may affect the effectiveness of the operations of the Civil Judgment Enforcement Office and the Bailiff.

Summary of practice also shows that in the period 2009-2015, when Bailiffs were authorized to apply security measures and enforcement measures like Enforcement Officers, they were effective in organizing the enforcement of civil judgments. However, from 2020 to now, Bailiffs are no longer assigned this authority, which has greatly limited the results of civil judgment enforcement. Some Associations and Bailiff Offices have proposed to consider this issue to ensure the feasibility of regulations on the socialization of civil judgment enforcement activities.

Source: https://daibieunhandan.vn/giai-quyet-tinh-trang-cham-tre-trong-thu-tuc-de-nghi-bo-nhiem-giam-dinh-vien-tu-phap-10394293.html