Mathieu Laurent (Avocat à la Cour, Partner); Raphaël Schindler (Avocat à la Cour, Senior Associate) Photo : Luther

  Mathieu Laurent (Avocat à la Cour, Partner); Raphaël Schindler (Avocat à la Cour, Senior Associate) Photo : Luther

Luxembourg’s “Paperless Justice” project, whose aim is to establish digital justice, has entered a new phase with the adoption of a law of 20 July 2023 on digitisation of urgent proceedings before the administrative court, which will enter into force on 16 September 2023.

The “Paperless Justice” project is an ambitious programme for the digitisation of justice that began in 2015. As the Luxembourg legislator has taken a cautious, step-by-step approach, the project has been split into 13 distinct initiatives, which are all aimed at reducing the extent of paper-based exchanges in judicial procedures.

The initiative that consisted in making case law easily available to the public (code name: “JUMDJ”), which involved the anonymisation of several tens of thousands of judgements and the creation of a new electronic database, was completed in 2020.

The law of 20 July 2023 represents a first step in the implementation of the initiative that consists in the digitisation of administrative proceedings (code name: “JANGA”). This first step consists in digitising urgent (summary) administrative proceedings, i.e. requests for stay of execution or for safeguard measures.

More specifically, the law of 20 July 2023 provides for the electronic transmission of such requests to the court via a secured electronic exchange platform. Once a request and the supporting documents have been uploaded on the platform, the court’s office checks that the data has been entered correctly and registers the case. Once a judgement has been rendered, it is transmitted electronically to the lawyers and to the Government representative by the court’s office. These new modalities should allow for a more efficient handling of requests and for more flexibility (as the secured electronic exchange platform will remain active and available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week).

While at this stage, these new modalities only concern the abovementioned summary proceedings, the legislator’s next step will be to extend digitisation to all types of administrative proceedings, including proceedings on the merits. Ultimately, the Luxembourg legislator intends to digitise civil and commercial as well as criminal proceedings, and it is foreseen that the “Paperless Justice” project will be fully completed in 2026.

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