Beijing court hears 9,500 cases against govt departments in 5 years

Beijing No 4 Intermediate People's Court heard about 9,500 lawsuits against government departments in the past five years, with more than 10 percent of them resolved through mediation.

The court, established on December 30, 2014, heard a total of 9,466 cases between residents and government agencies by the end of 2019, of which 9,342 were resolved, according to a statement issued by the court on Thursday.

"The cases mainly covered government departments of labor and social security, education, health care, food, medicine, city construction and environmental protection," said Cheng Hu, vice-president of the court.

He added that litigation relating to people's livelihood made up a big percentage among the administrative lawsuits.

The court increased efforts in explaining laws to litigants instead of just announcing verdicts after case hearings, aiming to entirely resolve conflicts between residents and government agencies in this way as well as to prevent similar problems from happening again, he said.

"We also pushed forward government department officials to attend litigation to directly respond to public concerns and questions during trials, hoping to help the officials understand the root of the lawsuits and enhance their legal awareness," he said.

In the past five years, more than 6,000 officials, including those at ministerial or provincial level, came to the court to attend case hearings, the statement said.

Previously, residents often complained it was hard to see officials in case hearings, or their problems were still not fully resolved through litigation, "but now the situation has changed," Cheng said, adding more officials would like to go to the court to know what the people demand and learn how to solve problems by rule of law.