From filing to ruling

Once an appeal or petition is received by the Supreme Administrative Court, a case is registered. An initial review of the case is then conducted to assess whether it meets the requirements for lodging an appeal or petition.

Cases that require leave to appeal are reviewed by the head of the drafting division or a judge referee, who will conduct a judicial inquiry in order to be able to make a proposal as to whether the case should be granted leave to appeal. One or more justices of the Supreme Administrative Court will then grant or refuse leave to appeal. Of all the cases received, only a handful are granted leave to appeal. There is no right to appeal against a refused leave to appeal, meaning the case will be closed once such a decision is reached.

Once leave to appeal has been granted, the Court will normally initiate proceedings. This means the parties will be given the opportunity to provide a written response to one another’s statements. It is very seldom that oral proceedings take place in the Supreme Administrative Court. A judge referee is responsible for proceedings.

Once a case that has been granted leave to appeal is ready for a ruling, a judge referee will conduct an in-depth judicial inquiry. She or he will prepare a discussion material and a proposed judgment or decision. The judge referee will then submit this documentation together with the judicial inquiry and documents submitted in the case to five justices.

The judge referee presents the case orally to the justices. The justices will then deliberate. The justices may sometimes make an immediate ruling in a case; however, it is more common that they will reconvene one or more times some weeks after the presentation for further deliberation before adjudicating.

Once the justices have signed the final judgment or decision, a court clerk will dispatch it to the parties. As the Supreme Administrative Court is the final instance, you cannot appeal the rulings of the Court. 

The amount of time it takes from filing to adjudication varies from one case to the next. Factors that affect the amount of time include the scope or legal complexity of a case, whether leave to appeal is granted and the Court’s workload at any given time. It is therefore impossible to state the amount of time it will take for a given case to be presented or decided.