Justice Minister George Floridis and Deputy Minister of Justice Ioannis Bougas today presented the provisions of the new Code of Civil Procedure, whose implementation will begin on September 16, 2025.

In particular, Mr Floridis described as a tragic event to make final decisions by the Greek courts in 1,500 days and now with its new provisions will be issued in 630 days.

Innovative provisions are included in the new Code of Civil Procedure presented today by Mr Floridis and Deputy Minister of Justice Ioannis Bougas, in order to significantly reduce the time of law decisions.

The implementation of the new provisions of the CCP will begin with the new judicial year (September 16, 2025) and will apply to any lawsuits, etc. They will be filed during the new judicial year, while pending cases will be tried with the current CCP.

The new provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure, as Mr Bougas analyzed, implements a series of targeted interventions, which are expected to function as an institutional tool to reduce the time of issuance of a definitive and final decision.

This legislative initiative is part of the road map announced by the Ministry of Justice in the vote of the judicial map, with the aim of maximizing its implementation benefits and its additional operation with other laws of the Ministry of Justice, such as the transfer of court to lawyers.

Specifically, the goal is Greece, from 1,492 days to adopt a final decision required today, to achieve the average of the Council of Europe countries, ie one year (about 350 days) for the final decision of both years (about 650 days) for the issuance of a final decision.

For this reason, the reform of the Code of Civil Procedure relates to all procedural stages, from the filing of the introductory proceedings to the first instance to the issuance of a final (and subsequent) irrevocable decision.

Indeed, as an example, it was mentioned that with today’s data, at the Athens Court of First Instance, one case is being discussed after 3 years after the lawsuit was filed and the decision is issued after months. Overall, on average, the Athens Court of First Instance takes 3 to 4 years to issue a definitive decision, “which is not in line with the claim of citizens for rapid and effective justice,” Mr Floridis stressed.

However, with the implementation of the new CCPD, the final decisions will be issued within:

-In 6 months of regular process decisions,

-In 4 months the decision -making decisions and

-In a month the decisions of interim measures.

Pre -trial

The new provisions also seek to exploit the time of the “pre -trial”, which today is indisputable, without substantial actions. The regulation aims to limit and properly utilize the time of the pre -trial pre -trial is that of the new Article 237 of the Code.

Article 237 of the Code of Civil Procedure establishes for the first time by the judge, who, if he finds any shortcomings or defects in the case file, issues a provision in which he considers the action unacceptable or indefinitely and establishes a specific time limit in order to correct it. If this deadline expires, then the provision is validated, the proceedings are completed and the case is deleted from the panel. The result of this procedure is the abolition of any repetitive debate, as any omission or defect of the action may have been supplemented or corrected by the party before the hearing, thanks to the reported provision issued by the judge.

Even with the new CCPD, appeals on decisions issued are lodged with the court that issued the ruling. That is, with the applicable procedural framework, when the Court of First Instance issues a decision and the party losing the case, it appeals and that appeal shall be lodged with the Court of First Instance which issued the appeal.

Then, after a few months, the appeal with the entire case file is forwarded to the Court of Appeal. There, the Secretariat specifies the department where the case will be forwarded and after a few months the chairman of the department will set the date of discussion of the case after several months or years.

Now with the new provision, the appeals of the courts of first -instance rulings will not be lodged with the Court of First Instance issued by the decision, but will be lodged with the appeal to be judged, thereby resolving the cases of cases in the Court of Appeals and reducing the amount of the lawsuits in the courts.

At the same time, with another Amendment of the Code of Civil Procedure, the wills and the declaration of a lady (as well as the issuance of the relevant certificates, which are currently delaying excessively due to the judicial proceedings), will now be made by notaries within a week, ie from 1 to 7 days, and today at least 300 days are required, while at least 300 days are required. Curators, as responsible.

At the same time, one of the innovations of the new CCP is the creation of an electronic platform to operate the digital case file. This platform is already “set up” in cooperation with the Ministry of Justice with the Ministry of Digital Governance.

The implementation of the digital case file will begin in 2025 and will first be linked to the Land Registry.

In the digital case file, lawyers from their offices will now file the lawsuits and other remedies electronically, while being able to monitor the course of each case initially from the lawsuit to the Court of First Instance, later in the Court of Appeal, until the final decision was issued by the Supreme Court. Lawyers using the passwords they have received will be able to access the documents in the case file at any time and carry out procedural actions online.

In the digital case file, all judicial decisions, all evidence, all the testimonies and any other information concerning the case will remain permanently stored.

In addition, the digital case file will make a decisive contribution to discharging the thousands of cases pending for Katseli Law (Law 3869/2010) for indebted households with red loans that have passed to Servicers (otherwise funds).

The leadership of the Ministry of Justice estimates that with the operation of the digital case file, the more than 32,000 pending cases in the Court of First Instance on the implementation of the Katseli Law will have been cleared and decisions will have been issued within the next three years.

Transfer of court

In the context of the congestion of judges and courts, the leadership of the Ministry of Justice is proceeding with a new transfer of court material to lawyers and notaries.

The lawyers will again be transferred to new courts and in particular the issuance of the payment orders will be issued. The payment order is not a judicial decision, but a “act” of the judge and is issued, without any proceedings in the audience. Payment order concerns financial or debt requirements eg. checks, foreign exchange, order bills, etc.

Notaries pass the publications of the will. Today the publication of a will in Athens requires at least one and a half years, while the issuance of a certificate of non -publication requires at least five months.

At the same time, one of the innovative proposals of the new CCP is the establishment of exclusive and binding deadlines for both the parties on both sides and for the judges who are charged with the cases.

The new provisions drastically reduce the pre -trial (Article 237 CCP), that is, the time between the lawsuit to the hearing, as well as the time from the day of the discussion to the issuance of the judicial decision, for which the parties and lawyers have been waiting for years …

In other words, the time is made to the fullest time before the hearing of each case is discussed, with a thorough pre -audit by a judge, so that the cases are brought to the hearing.

With the current data for the hearing of an urban case, the original file closes after about 130 days and can then pass from 2.5 to 3 years without the slightest judicial action and of course without the case reaching the audience.

Finally, as mentioned by the Deputy Minister of Justice, under the legal initiatives for the next period, key changes to the Code of Lawyers are included. For this reason, the President of the Plenary of the Presidents of the Bar Associations Dimitris Vervesos and the President of the Association of Judges and Prosecutors Christoforos Sevastidis have been summoned to the Ministry of Justice.