Specialist Courts and Tribunals

Employment Court

There were 170 new cases filed in the Employment Court in the 2015, 6% fewer than the 181 cases filed in 2014. The Court cleared more cases than were received, with 184 disposals. The number of active cases on hand has subsequently reduced by 7% from 123 to 114 over the past year.

Environment Court

The number of filings in the Environment Court has remained similar, with 371 appeals filed in the year ending 31 December 2015, 2 fewer than in the previous year. The Court disposed of 428 cases in the 2015, compared with 500 in 2014. The number of active cases has been reduced by 8%, from 421 at 31 December 2014 to 386 at 31 December 2015.

Coronial Services

There has been a small increase in referrals to the Coroner, with 5,647 referrals in the 2015, compared to 5,582 in 2014. The number of cases resolved has also remained steady, with 5,636 cases resolved in 2015 compared with 5,612 in 2014. The consistent number of referrals to Coronial Services and number of cases disposed has resulted in the number of active cases on hand showing little change, With 2,989 cases on hand as at 31 December 2015 compared with 2,944 12 months earlier.

Māori Land Court

There were 6,046 new cases filed in the court in 2015. This is an increase of 9% from the 5,544 new cases that were filed in the previous. Over the same period, the volume of cases disposed also fell by 7% from 6,130 cases in 2014 to 5,722.
With cases being filed and disposed of in equal numbers in the 2015 , there has been little change in the number of active cases on hand in the Māori Land Court, with 4,240 cases on hand as at 31 December 2015 (compared with 3,924 active cases at 31 December 2014).

Tribunals and Authorities

Tenancy Tribunal

The Tenancy Tribunal accounts for 64% of new business in the tribunals and authorities administered by the Ministry of Justice (excluding Disputes Tribunal figures, which are reported separately). New business decreased by 6% with 18,885 applications lodged in 2015, compared to 19,974 in 2014.

The tribunal disposed 18,948 cases in 2015, a 6% decrease in disposals compared to 20,175 cases in 2014, which reflects the above fall in new business. The number of cases on hand at 31 December 2015 was 256, a decline of 27% compared to the 349 cases that were on hand at the end of 2014.

Private Security Personnel Licensing Authority

The Private Security Personnel Licensing Authority represented 21% of new business for tribunals and authorities in 2015.

In the 2015 there were 6,380 applications, a 36% increase compared to 2014, when there were 4,687 applications. The Authority disposed of 9,267 applications in 2015, an increase of 44% compared to the previous where 6,419 applications were disposed.

These large increases in applications and disposals are due new legislative requirements to provide evidence of training which came into effect 1 October 2014, as well as the jurisdiction of the PSPLA being extended to include repossession agents as of March 2015, three months into the most recent reporting period.

Immigration and Protection Tribunal

The Immigration and Protection Tribunal (IPT) represented approximately 4% of the tribunals and authorities new business in the 2015. The IPT received 1,197 cases during this time, a decrease of 14% compared to the previous year when there were 1,395 cases received.

A total of 1,596 cases were disposed during 2014, compared to 1,310 disposals in the previous year, a 22% increase. With a clearance rate of 133% in 2015, the number of active cases as at 31 December 2015 fell to 830 from 1229 as at 31 December 2014, a 32% decrease.

Disputes Tribunal

Comparing 2015 to 2014, the Disputes Tribunal has seen a 12% decrease in new cases to 13,419 from 15,283. The number of disposals exceeded then the number of new cases, although there was a 5% decrease in the disposal of cases to 13,959 from 14,751. The Tribunal's number of active cases on hand decreased to 2,902 as at 31 December 2015, from 3,442 active cases as at 31 December 2014.

Statistics

Workload
Specialist Courts and Tribunals workload statistics
Disputes Tribunal workload statistics