WILLEMSTAD - The Common Court of Justice is the first court in the Kingdom to work digitally in tax matters. From the Court of First Instance in Aruba up to and including the cassation procedure at the Supreme Court. This means that a digital file is used throughout the entire process.
Supreme Court
Since 1 July 2016, the Supreme Court in The Hague has been a cassation judge in tax cases for the Caribbean part of the Kingdom. Initially, there were a few cassation cases per year, but that number has increased to just under ten cases in 2021 and 2022.
Files in cassation cases were previously sent to the Netherlands by diplomatic post via the Minister Plenipotentiary. That took some time; the Completion of a file also took time.
Due to good cooperation between the Supreme Court and the Common Court, the submission of files in tax cases has now been digitized.
Marjan Boerlage, counselor in the tax chamber of the Supreme Court and contact counsel for the Joint Court: “With the proverbial push of a button, the Supreme Court can now have access to the digital file in tax cases in which an appeal in cassation has been filed. That is important for the lead time of the cassation procedure, it is faster and more efficient.”
The Automation and Informatization department of the Supreme Court has incorporated the input of files in digital form, specifically for these files, into the digital system of the Supreme Court. That went smoothly because of the short lines. But also through good cooperation between the two organizations, so that wishes and possibilities could be properly linked to each other.
This resulted in the introduction of digital files in criminal cases in 2021.
Digitization
Digitization is important and indispensable, also for the judiciary and is one of the ways to make access to justice accessible and simple.
It is important to keep in touch with technical and social developments in this area and to respond to them as much as possible. The Supreme Court does that as well.
The digital working environment of the Supreme Court has been familiar to members and employees who use the system for many years, with process files being digitally available or made available.
Digital litigation for litigants in the Netherlands is now also possible in all three jurisdictions.
An exception has been made in the procedural regulations of the Supreme Court for Caribbean cases. For the time being, these cases can still be litigated on paper now that there is not yet a means of login for the Caribbean. “We are working hard to make a login tool available. No login is required for submitting the digital files.”
