Click here to print a chart of the duties and responsibilities of a Justice of the Peace.

All Justices of the Peace perform Ministerial Duties, but only some will carry out Judicial Duties. A Justice of the Peace wishing to perform Judicial Duties must undertake and complete a course in Judicial Studies with the Open Polytechnic and attend training sessions arranged by their local Associations.

Ministerial Duties | Judicial Duties | Judicial Activities

Comprise principally:

1. Witnessing signatures
2. Certifying documents
3. The witnessing of Land Transfer and other documents
4. The taking of declarations, affidavits or affirmations

Although, in a sense, the two classifications of duties overlap as certain of the powers conferred upon a Justice are discretionary, in reality the last three Ministerial duties are not usually performed by Justices of the Peace who have not attended and passed the Judicial Studies course. This is because the Justice when attending to those three duties must be satisfied that the information they are acting upon is accurate and in accordance with the law.

Only by having attended and successfully completed the Judicial Studies course does a Justice have the requisite skill and knowledge to handle those duties.

All the duties of a Justice are important and Justices must be thoroughly familiar with the carrying out of those duties. Although not every Justice becomes involved in Judicial duties, every Justice must carry out Ministerial duties. On-going training and support are offered for both Ministerial and Judicial duties.

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Judicial Duties

Involve suitably trained Justices attending the District Court to carry out such functions as:

1. Jurisdiction determined by statute, including minor offences and some traffic cases
2. Issue of remands and Bail
3. Hearing of undefended cases
4. Presiding over defended trials
5. Preliminary hearing of indictable offences
6. The receiving of informations and complaints and the issue of summonses
7. The issue of search warrants
8. The issue of summonses to witnesses

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Judicial Activities

Royal Federation again acknowledges the active commitment and support for our work from the Chief District Court Judge, Russell Johnson and his colleagues in the country’s District Courts.

Judicial Statistics (October years)

* There is a distortion in the figures relating to the data being provided by some Associations which we are continuing to work with the Ministry of Justice in this regard.

The figures reflect an ever increasing use of Justices of the Peace to effectively subsidise the Court processes of the country with limited recognition. Associations and members will be well aware that as part of the process on the submissions on the Justices of the Peace Amendment Act Royal Federation made strenuous efforts to have recognition of this work included in the decisions of Parliament. As advised separately this matter remains a high priority for the Executive and advances should be made this coming year on submissions made and discussions with the Minister and Ministry.

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