JUSTICE TRENDS JUSTICE TRENDS Nr. 1 | June 2017 | Page 88

JUDICIAL TRAINING / FORMACIÓN JUDICIAL
JT: It is well known that on the one hand, the courts in Portugal
lack staff and on the other hand, they would need more effective
management of human resources. In addition, to cope with the
scarcity of magistrates in the system, the Ministry of Justice is
considering reducing the time of training of magistrates (from
3 to 2 years).
How do you see an eventual reduction in training time?
Will CEJ be able to guarantee the standard requirements
and training quality if this change is to be verified?
EL: The answer is in the question itself, that is, the legislator himself
understands that a judge, or a public prosecutor, is only well
trained at the end of the three year period that I just referred
to – one year relatively more theoretical in CEJ, one year in
court (to adapt to the reality of the court) and one last year in
court working directly with the proceedings, a professional
internship. If this is the understanding of the legislator himself of
a thorough training, that adequately filters the capacity, not only
technical, but also the personal capacity of the candidates for
magistrates, it is evident that this reduction is not a good th