Justice delivered by our 'super tribunal' THEY gather every weekday morning on the 10th floor of an inner-city building, waiting for Queensland's "super tribunal" to hear everything from tenancy disputes to tree, trader and building cases. Clutching their documents, dozens of people nervously eye off opponents as they prepare to argue their cases, mostly without the help of lawyers. Justice can be swift in the Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal, where minor civil disputes make up the vast majority of almost 30,000 cases lodged each year. Many disputes are heard, summed up and decided by members or adjudicators within 25 minutes. "I've only ever seen that show Judge Judy a few times, but those minor civil dispute rooms remind me of Judge Judy," QCAT president Justice Alan Wilson says. The tribunal deals with guardianship, anti-discrimination, building, children's matters, retail shop leases, neighbour disputes, disciplinary cases and its own internal appeals. Wilson is in awe of the senior members, ordinary members, sessional members and adjudicators who efficiently deal with complex, often emotionally charged disputes that could tie up civil courts for days. On the 10th floor there are unhappy fishermen, unlicensed taxi drivers, unhappy tenants and landlords, allegedly misbehaving teachers. The whole of life is out there," he says. Next month QCAT, set up just more than three years ago after 18 tribunals and 23 jurisdictions were merged, will receive its 100,000th application. The independent tribunal, which is supposed to offer "accessible, fair, just, economical, informal and quick" hearings and decisions, is about to undergo a review of its Act and a radical change. In a six-month trial, from June 30 legally trained Justices of the Peace, sitting with 30 non-legal JPs, will be paid just $100 a day each to decide non-urgent tenancy and minor civil disputes under the value of $5000. QCAT's current 123 decision-makers include retired judges, a criminologist, a plumber, psychologists, social workers, teachers, vets, doctors and other medical professionals and 83 people with legal backgrounds. There are sessional members with backgrounds in economics, speech therapy, youth work, fishing and pharmacy. The 10 adjudicators handling most minor civil disputes are all lawyers. Headed by Wilson, a former District Court judge, and deputy president Judge Alexander Horneman-Wrenn, the tribunal has four senior members with extensive court and tribunal experience. They are each paid $271,082 a year. Ten members each receive $192,956, 10 adjudicators are paid $120,069 and 99 sessional members, who sit part-time around the state, receive from $453 to $759 for more than four hours' work a day. We get real people in here. That's the refreshing thing about QCAT," Wilson says. He is used to being called everything from "youse" to "your majesty" by those who appear before him. "Some of them who've watched American television will say 'Youse, with respect'," he says with obvious delight. There are cases about dodgy traders ripping off customers, guardianship for the aged, the conduct of doctors, lawyers and jockeys, bitter fights between caravan park residents, gun licences and menacing dogs. Many are sorted out before hearings through mediation or compulsory conferences. Parties ask to be legally represented in only 4 per cent of cases. Some cases spark plenty of emotion and repeated hearings and appeals, including one involving a complaint by French tenants that their rented Sunshine Coast pole house smelt of dog urine. The dispute escalated into a physical altercation in the corridors of the Brisbane tribunal, police were called to a real estate agency and the property, one of the tenants sought counselling and the stressed owner moved to Tasmania. "The building jurisdiction generates enormous amounts of passion, heat, money and trouble," Wilson says. QCAT now has a team of 16 arborists going to properties to sort out neighbours' tree disputes and Wilson would love to have a similar team of building experts. His other dream is to have extra adjudicators "constantly circling like sheepdogs" outside the Brisbane hearing rooms, rounding up people who want a last chance to settle matters and avoid hearings. They're ripe, they're like low-hanging fruit for a mediator outside the hearing. They don't want to go in there," he says. Guardianship matters represent the second highest number of tribunal applications, with 6420 lodged between July last year and February 28 and the numbers are expected to increase. Almost half of the 10,270 minor civil dispute claims lodged last year were over private and public tenancy and real estate agents complain of their frustration at waiting weeks for hearings, while tenants' debts mount. In April last year QCAT almost ran out of money to fund state-wide hearings by sessional members, until Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie injected an extra $150,000. Wilson believes the tribunal could soon face the same funding problem, but he is confident QCAT will continue to handle the "tsunami" of cases in a quick and efficient way.