Find an Expert – Publication of Information Sheets on the European e-Justice Portal
Co-financed by the Directorate General for Justice and Consumers of the European Commission, the EEEI’s project Find an Expert began in September 2017 and came to an end in December 2019. The project aimed at contributing to the enhancement of mutual trust in justice between judges, lawyers, experts and citizens of the European Union by gathering information about expert proceedings in the EU Members States through a questionnaire, cf. also https://experts-institute.eu/en/projects/find-an-expert-first-milestone/. The information gathered from jurists all over Europe has been evaluated by the participants in the project and compiled in information sheets per Member State.
The information sheets contain information about lists and registers of experts permitting to find an expert in the respective Member State, the qualification and remuneration of experts, the liability of experts, the appointment of experts by courts and the procedural rules regarding expert proceedings.
At the end of 2019, these information sheets have been sent to e-justice. Subsequently, the representatives of the Member States at e-justice have been informed about the content of the information sheet regarding their respective Member State and asked for validation of the information provided. The validation process concerning the information sheets took several months and was finally completed in summer 2020. In some occasions, this process required the representatives of the Member States at e-justice to get back to the EEEI so that the EEEI could clarify certain aspects with the contacts who had provided the information. Questions which had to be clarified with the participants in the survey concerned, for example, the coverage of expenses which may arise in the context of expert proceedings and the communication between the expert and the parties involved in the expert proceedings.
After the validation of the information, the information sheets were translated from English into the languages of the Member States of the European Union. They can now be accessed at https://e-justice.europa.eu/content_find_an_expert-37146-en.do?init=true. The relevant information concerning a Member State can be accessed by clicking on the flag of the respective Member State. The language of the information sheet can be chosen at the top of the website. The validation of several information sheets is still pending so that information regarding some Member States, like Belgium or Italy, for example, will only be accessible at a later point in time.
The information provided enables the parties involved in cross-border litigation or arbitration expert proceedings to choose an adequate expert from a particular wide international pool of experts. This facilitates the avoidance of conflicts of interest of experts while, at the same time, allowing for the choice of an expert who is sufficiently specialized. The information provided can also be helpful in out-of-court settlement attempts. The need for a wider pool of international experts increases with the growth of the amount of cross-border conflicts and the increase in mechanization. Adequate technical expertise and sufficient language skills of the expert are often crucial for the resolution of a dispute.
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The European Commission does not accept any responsibility for use that may be made of the information it contains.
