KINGSTON, Jamaica – Prime Minister, Andrew Holness, has Commonwealth legal pracitioners that there is a need to share ideas and strengthen justice systems in response to current global challenges.
Jamaica Prime Minister Andrew Holness addressing the Commonwealth Magistrates & Judges’ Association (CMJA) 2026 Annual Conference.“Caseloads are becoming more complex; technology is changing both the administration of justice and the nature of the matters coming before the courts. Transnational organised crime, cybercrime, and increasingly sophisticated financial crimes present new challenges,” Holness told the Commonwealth Magistrates & Judges’ Association (CMJA) 2026 Annual Conference, which ends here on Thursday.
“This conference provides an opportunity to learn from one another, to compare experiences, examine emerging challenges, share innovations, and consider how the administration of justice can continue to evolve while preserving the fundamental principles upon which our legal system rests,” he said.
The conference is being held under the theme “Sustainable Justice, For Today, For Tomorrow, For All,” and has brought together judicial officers from across the 56-member Commonwealth to discuss key issues affecting the administration of justice.
The programme will address judicial performance and accountability, judicial independence, open justice and privacy, judicial integrity, access to justice and the rule of law. It will also include a meeting of Chief Justices on September 20.
Holness said that he hoped the delegates will return to their respective jurisdictions with ideas and experiences that strengthen the administration of justice, reaffirming his administration’s commitment to strengthening Jamaica’s institutions of justice.
“The government recognises that a modern society requires a justice system that is independent… properly resourced, technologically capable and accessible to the people it serves,” he said.
Jamaica’s Governor-General, Sir Patrick Allen, noted that the conference is taking place at a consequential time for the administration of justice, telling delegates that the courts over which they preside today bear little resemblance, in some respects, to those of a generation ago, due to technology altering the way that justice is administered.
“Citizens rightly expect institutions to be more accessible, more efficient and more responsive. New and increasingly complex questions are being placed before our courts, even while long-standing challenges of delay, resources and access remain. The judiciary must, therefore, respond to these realities.:
The Governor General noting the aptness of the conference theme, said that “sustainable justice cannot simply mean courts that function efficiently today.
“It has to contemplate institutions sufficiently resilient to serve generations we will never meet, legal systems capable of embracing innovation without surrendering principle, and judiciaries sufficiently independent to administer justice without fear, favour or undue influence.”
