Hong Kong Judiciary Annual Report 2015

Caseload, Case Disposal and Waiting Time at Different Court Levels

High Court

CASELOAD AND CASE DISPOSAL OF THE HIGH COURT

		Caseload			Disposal *
		2013	2014	2015	2013	2014	2015
Court of Appeal
Appellate
-	Criminal
	Appeals from the Court of First Instance	158	185	190	168	185	170
	Appeals from the District Court	291	261	251	365	255	261
	Sub-total	449	446	441	533	440	431
-	Civil
	Appeals from the Court of First Instance	233	219	225	195	220	219
	Appeals from the District Court	21	18	19	29	14	29
	Miscellaneous Appeals	27	25	35	18	27	29
	Sub-total	281	262	279	242	261	277
Review of Sentences
-	Criminal
	Reviews from the Court of First Instance	2	2	0	2	2	1
	Reviews from the District Court	2	4	1	6	6	0
	Reviews from the Magistrates' Courts	0	0	0	2	0	0
	Sub-total	4	6	1	10	8	1
	Total	734	714	721	785	709	709

*	Case disposal refers to appeals/reviews which have been allowed, dismissed, withdrawn, discontinued or abandoned with or without court order

		Caseload			Disposal *
		2013	2014	2015	2013	2014	2015
Court of First Instance
Appellate
-	Criminal
	Appeals from Magistrates' Courts	809	771	777	840	765	756
-	Civil
	Appeals from Labour Tribunal	23	29	47	22	22	31
	Appeals from Small Claims Tribunal	53	66	76	53	66	67
	Appeals from Minor Employment Claims Adjudication Board	2	7	3	3	3	5
	Miscellaneous Appeals	1	0	2	0	0	2
	Sub-total	79	102	128	78	91	105
	Total	888	873	905	918	856	861

First Instance
-	Criminal Jurisdiction
	Criminal Cases	571	545	503	503	503	493
	Confidential Miscellaneous Proceedings	326	346	402	326	346	402
	Application for Discharge	0	0	0	0	0	0
	Sub-total	897	891	905	829	849	895
-	Civil Jurisdiction
	High Court Actions	2 602	2 641	3 125	1 595	1 658	1 955
	Miscellaneous Proceedings	3 479	3 362	3 471	2 495	2 424	2 478
	Bankruptcy & Companies Winding-up+	10 712	11 267	11 087	10 761	11 058	11 008
	Personal Injuries Actions	1 108	1 405	1 418	911	1 037	1 173
	Other cases ^#	593	590	656	226	288	256
	Sub-total	18 494	19 265	19 757	15 988	16 465	16 870
	Total	19 391	20 156	20 662	16 817	17 314	17 765

-	Masters Chambers
	Interlocutory hearings^**	23 194	25 591	27 250	21 556	22 880	24 407
	Taxation bills	603	697	643	444⁽¹⁾	544⁽¹⁾	448⁽¹⁾
-	Probate
	Applications	16 967	17 931	19 127	16 664⁽²⁾	17 498⁽²⁾	18 583⁽²⁾

*	Case disposal refers to appeals which have been allowed, dismissed, withdrawn, discontinued or abandoned with or without court order; criminal cases where defendants have been convicted or acquitted; and civil cases where claims have been successfully made or dismissed
+	Cases include bankruptcy proceedings, companies winding-up proceedings, applications for Interim Order (Bankruptcy) and applications to set aside Statutory Demands
#	Other cases include constitutional and administrative law proceedings, admiralty actions, adoptions, bill of sale registrations, book debt registrations, commercial actions, construction and arbitration cases, matrimonial causes, applications under the Mental Health Ordinance, probate actions and stop notices
**	The caseload figure represents the number of interlocutory applications listed with hearings, and the disposal figure represents the number of the interlocutory applications heard in the reporting period
	Note (1) : Case disposal refers to taxation bills processed
	Note (2) : Case disposal refers to grants issued/grants resealed/estates administration completed by the Official Administrator in summary manner

AVERAGE WAITING TIME FOR CASES IN THE HIGH COURT

		Average Waiting Time (days)
		2015 Target	2013 (Actual)	2014 (Actual)	2015 (Actual)
Court of Appeal
-	Criminal - from setting down of a case to hearing	50	50	51	53
-	Civil - from application to fix date to hearing	90	138	117	112
Court of First Instance
-	Criminal Fixture List - from filing of indictment to hearing	120	211	227	272
-	Criminal Running List - from setting down of a case to hearing	90	83	86	81
-	Civil Fixture List - from application to fix date to hearing	180	261	193	140
-	Civil Running List - from setting down of a case to hearing ^△	-	85	-	-
-	Civil Running List - from not-to-be-warned date to hearing ^△	30	-	19	7
-	Appeals from Magistrates' Courts - from lodging of Notice of Appeal to hearing	90	105	104	100

^△

Upon endorsement by the Court Users’ Committees, the target for Civil Running List of the Court of First Instance of the High Court is revised from the previous description, i.e. “from setting down of a case to hearing” to that of “from not-to-be-warned date to hearing”, which is considered as a more appropriate way in measuring the waiting time for Civil Running List. The target is set at 30 days effective from 1 January 2014.