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Basseterre, St. Kitts, March 05, 2019 (SKNIS): Services at the Sir Lee Llewellyn Moore Judicial and Legal Complex in St. Kitts are expected to be expanded with the construction of an annex that would house a third magistrate’s court chamber and a mediation centre dedicated to criminal and family matters.

This was revealed by the Honourable Vincent Byron, Attorney General and Minister of Justice and Legal Affairs, at the opening ceremony of the 40 hour Mediation Skills Programme 2019 on Monday, March 04, at the Royal St. Kitts Hotel, who noted that construction is expected to begin in a few weeks.

“This gives us the type of infrastructure to help facilitate, as it was, the administration of justice here in St. Kitts and Nevis, and continue to ensure that the rule of law here in our small but dynamic Federation is upheld,” said the attorney general, adding that the rule of law is the “bedrock of any democratic society.”

In speaking of the rule of law, Minister Byron used the occasion to touch briefly on the World Justice Project (WJP) Rule of Law Index 2019 Report, where St. Kitts and Nevis ranked 30^th from 126 countries and jurisdictions worldwide. Only Barbados at 29th place ranks higher than St. Kitts and Nevis in the Caribbean Region.

“It is something that we have to thank our form of government for, that on one hand our judiciary is one in which you all have confidence in, where we have to respect our judges and the decisions they make,” he said.  “We have to respect the administration of justice and this is what makes a country tick, that we can have rules by which we operate and when we have disputes these can be resolved by fair-minded individuals with integrity to give us the type of answers that we need to move on… with disputes.

According to www.worldjusticeproject.org, The World Justice Project Rule of Law Index measures how the rule of law is experienced and perceived by the general public in 126 countries and jurisdictions worldwide based on more than 120,000 household and 3,800 expert surveys. Featuring primary data, the WJP Rule of Law Index measures countries’ rule of law performance across eight factors: Constraints on Government Powers, Absence of Corruption, Open Government, Fundamental Rights, Order and Security, Regulatory Enforcement, Civil Justice, and Criminal Justice.