Judicial Yuan nominee vows to tackle judge shortage and overwork

Taipei, July 9 (CNA) Senior prosecutor Tsai Chiu-ming (蔡秋明), nominated by President Lai Ching-te (賴清德) to lead Taiwan's highest judicial body, the Judicial Yuan, said Wednesday his top priority if confirmed would be to address the shortage of judges and widespread overwork.

Speaking at a confirmation hearing at the Legislature, Tsai said one of the most pressing challenges facing Taiwan's judicial system was the shortage of judges, which in turn contributed to the heavy caseloads borne by those currently on the bench.

When asked by ruling Democratic Progressive Party lawmaker Lin Dai-hua (林岱樺) how he would address these problems, Tsai said he would first seek to relax regulations under the Court Organization Act and push to increase the staffing quota for judges.

According to Judicial Yuan data, there were a total of 2,199 judges as of 2024, including eight justices on the Constitutional Court, with the rest serving in the Supreme Court, lower courts and other specialized courts.

The data also showed that in 2024 alone, approximately 4.4 million cases were filed in the courts, of which 4 million -- or 91.6 percent -- were newly lodged cases and 367,448 were previously filed cases.

In addition, Tsai said he would work to reduce judges' paperwork burdens -- such as preparing verdict documents -- and retain more support staff who assist judges with case reviews by raising their salaries.

The nominee said he also planned to decriminalize certain minor offenses, broaden the range of complaint-based prosecutions and promote out-of-court dispute resolution mechanisms to reduce the number of cases entering the judicial system.

During Wednesday's hearing, however, the nominee struggled to answer questions from lawmakers across party lines about broader issues facing the judicial system, such as ineffective evaluation mechanisms and corruption.

Opposition legislators, such as Lai Shyh-bao (賴士葆) from the Kuomintang (KMT), also voiced concerns over Tsai's qualifications to head the Judicial Yuan, citing his experience as being limited to prosecutorial affairs.

Tsai, who has served as a prosecutor for 29 years and is currently a senior prosecutor at the Taiwan High Prosecutors Office, admitted he was less familiar with the day-to-day operations of the judiciary.

Tsai was nominated as both a justice and the president of the Judicial Yuan, which oversees the Constitutional Court, by Lai in late March.

The Constitutional Court has been without nearly half of its normal panel of 15 justices since the terms of seven justices came to an end at the end of October 2024, and opposition legislators rejected all of Lai's nominees to fill the vacancies in December 2024.

Apart from Tsai, Lai also nominated six other justices -- two Supreme Court judges, one senior prosecutor, and three legal scholars -- to fill the Constitutional Court openings.

That is critical because with only eight judges, the Constitutional Court cannot hear cases due to a 10-justice minimum requirement.

In March, the president said he hoped the nominees would work to "strengthen professional capacity" in national security cases to ensure national security and clean governance.

In response to KMT legislator Wang Yu-min's (王育敏) question on Wednesday, however, Tsai said national security issues did not fall under the purview of justices.

Instead, he said that as a Taiwanese citizen, he shared the same concerns about national security issues as anyone else.

Tsai, 69, holds a bachelor's degree in law from National Taiwan University and a Master of Laws (LL.M.) from the University of Washington in the United States.

If his nomination is confirmed by the Legislature on July 25, he will become the first prosecutor to head the Judicial Yuan.