THE new jury management system at the Supreme Court has been improved with the provision of 15 desktop computers by the Government of Canada.

They were formally handed over to Justice Minister Delroy Chuck by Canadian High Commissioner to Jamaica Sylvain Fabí during a brief ceremony at the Supreme Court’s North Building on King Street, downtown Kingston, on Tuesday.

The computers, along with a high-density server, data backup and storage and firewall protection devices, form part of a $19.2-million provision allocated under the Canadian Government-funded Justice Undertaking for Social Transformation (JUST) project for the 2016/17 administrative year.

Under the project, funds have been provided to acquire modern state-of-the-art equipment for the main institutions of Jamaica’s justice system.

These include the Ministry of Justice, Attorney General’s Chambers, Office of the Parliamentary Counsel, Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions, as well as the Courts.

Welcoming the donation, Minister Chuck said the acquisition is consistent with the ministry’s “aggressive push” to modernise Jamaica’s court system in order to improve its overall efficiency.

“Modernisation of the court system cannot take place without 21st century cutting-edge technology, and these computers will go a very far way in helping our drive to provide First-World standard of justice for all Jamaican citizens,” he said.

In his remarks, Fabí cited the long history of collaboration on good governance in justice reform that Jamaica and Canada share, and underscored the importance of the JUST project.

“The project has allocated $460 million (Can$5.2 million) for the period 2012 to 2020… to build the capacity of the main justice institutions. With these resources, the Government of Jamaica will be able to acquire much-needed technological tools,” he pointed out.

Commending the Administration for embarking on a programme of reform, Fabí gave the Canadian Government’s undertaking of continued support in ensuring that Jamaica has a “more efficient and responsive” justice system.

For her part, Chief Justice Zaila McCalla also welcomed the donation.

“The timely delivery of justice is at the heart of any (judicial) system. The donation of these modern pieces of equipment will go a far way in assisting the staff of the courts to operate more efficiently and effectively in the undertaking of our daily functions (and) will help to transform the jury management system,” she said.

The 15 computers are part of an overall 85 that will be provided this year. The remaining 70 will be dispatched to Parish Courts across the island.

Four of these have already been deployed to Manchester, St Elizabeth, Westmoreland and Hanover.

These are in addition to 29 computers, as well as laptops and recording devices for judges, which the ministry previously received.