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maltatoday | SUNDAY • 1 MARCH 2020 15 LAW Dr Malcolm Mifsud is a partner at Mifsud & Mifsud Advocates ARTICLE 231 of the Code of Organ- isation and Civil Procedure (COCP) states that where several issues in an action have been determined by sepa- rate judgements, appeal from any such judgement may only be entered after the final judgement and within the pre- scribed time. However, the proviso to this article states that an appeal from such sepa- rate judgement may be entered before the final judgement only by leave of court to be read out in court. The Court will decide an application based on this Article in a restricted manner, in order to reflect the legisla- tors' intention to only allow such ap- peals from partial judgements in the interest of the expediency of certain cases. This was held by the First Hall Civil Court presided by Hon. Judge Grazio Mercieca on the 13th of February 2020 in the case Dragonara Gaming Limited vs Is-Segretarju Permanenti tal-Minis- teru responsabbli ghall-Finanzi et. The Court heard the pleas by the de- fendant, who argued that because the partial judgement was given in relation to a pre-emptory plea, that the Court should allow them to appeal in the in- terest of expediency. It was explained by the Honourable Court that through the amendments by Act XXIV of 1995, the decision on whether to appeal from a partial judge- ment or to appeal from the decree after the final judgement was given to the parties. Nonetheless, the Court was given the discretion to decide whether to allow this appeal of a partial judgement be- fore the final judgement or not based on the principle of proportionality. Although the law gives no criteria on which the adjudicator should base the decision, it was explained that the legislator intended to limit the delay- ing of cases through appeals of partial judgements and therefore they should only be allowed in exceptional circum- stances. Quoting the jurist Lord Woolf MR, it was explained that the conclusion of a case in a reasonable time should be the 'overriding objective' of the adjudicator as it is a fundamental hu- man right. It was stated that civil cases should '[embody] a three-dimensional concept of justice which incorporates the arriving at of judgements that are correct in fact and in law, by means of proportionate use of resources and within a reasonable time'. Therefore, the Court should only al- low appeals from partial judgements if it deems it proportionate in relation to the risk of a case taking longer than it should to be decided. The Court held that it cannot be said that the adjudicator should decide to allow an appeal from a partial judge- ment simply because the sentence be- ing appealed from regards a perempto- ry plea. It was reasoned that this is because if that would have been the legislators' intention, they would have drafted the law in such a manner. Furthemore, The Court stated that another important principle is that of prejudice to the party requesting the appeal from the partial judgement. It was held that this concept of prej- udice to one of the parties is not one which is alien to civil law, such that the COCP mentions a number of situ- ations wherein the adjudicator should decide whether to allow a plea based on whether rejecting the plea will cause more prejudice to the applicant than to the other party. It was held that in this case, since it was a commercial case, the applicant, being a Government entity, could not claim that it would suffer economic prejudice should the appeal not be heard immediately. Therefore, the Court rejected the ap- plication and ordered the case to be continued. Court will use principle of proportionality to determine whether a party can appeal a judgement in parte LAW maltatoday Get the critical perspective on politics, culture and society Be the first to enjoy our print newspaper with a subscription Understanding each other from a different perspective: our journalists and columnists will provide you with expert reporting, analysis and commentary. Order now at maltatoday.uberflip.com