As of the middle of 2011 the Austrian Federal Ministry of Justice will “insource” interpreting services for several languages at two major courts in Vienna to its service agency. While the Ministry is still working on the details (without consulting with the national association of court interpreters or any other of the parties involved) the budget implementation act, adopted on 22 December, states clearly that court interpreters certified under the Austrian law on court experts and court interpreters must only be assigned to hearings if no other “suitable person” is available. That law goes on to state that the interpreting fees laid down in the Austrian law on court interpreting fees must not be applied to the services provided by persons recruited by the Ministry’s service agency. The Ministry thinks that this will lead to “major cost savings” and plans to expand the new regime to other courts once the new system has become established. The changes may prove to be unconstitutional, as judges are no longer free to assign interpreters to court hearings. They will certainly not help to implement the goals of the EU Directive on the rights to interpretation and translation in criminal proceedings, i.e. to ensure high-quality court interpreting services for the benefit of fair trials, and most likely lead to complaints by defendants and witnesses about the inadequacy of judicial language services.
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