In multilingual Australia, it is essential for courts and tribunals to work with high quality interpreting services. The justice system cannot deliver procedural fairness unless it improves the conditions in which interpreting services are provided. However, basic conditions – such as background information about the interpreting assignment, regular breaks, adequate working space and appropriate equipment to perform simultaneous interpreting – are currently often denied or not provided, leading many qualified interpreters to refuse to work in court and tribunal settings.

The first edition of the Recommended National Standards for Working with Interpreters in Courts and Tribunals (RNS), released in 2017, describes interpreters as ‘officers of the court’ who are integral to putting non-English speakers in the same position as English speakers when dealing with the justice system. The RNS outline the conditions required for interpreters to perform their duties to a satisfactory level. These requirements are basic, common sense and easily implementable. However, five years after the publication of the RNS (and a decade after the AIJA national survey on Interpreter Policies, Practices and Protocols in Australian Courts and Tribunals), the recommendations are still not being consistently implemented.

In 2022 an updated second edition of the RNS was released: the Recommended National Standards for Working with Interpreters in Courts and Tribunals (RNS) Second Edition.

The Foreword to the Second Edition specifies that the bulk of the recommendations remain unchanged from the first edition, however it includes some key revisions:

• The language of the document has been adjusted to be more inclusive of tribunals and the different needs of the tribunal process compared to those of courts.
• In all circumstances and for all languages, the most highly certified or qualified interpreter should always be first preference.
• References to NAATI’s system of certification for interpreters and translators were updated to reflect the changes made to that system by NAATI in 2018.
• References to interpreters as ‘officers of the court’ were, where possible, qualified to emphasise that interpreters owe paramount duties to the court or tribunal and are independent of the party who may have hired them or the party they are interpreting for.

The Australian Institute of Interpreters and Translators (AUSIT) says it is time for these recommendations to be implemented in civil and criminal jurisdictions across the country, so that procedural fairness – whatever the language/s spoken by the parties involved – is truly possible.

We call on the Federal and State/Territory Ministers and Departments of Attorneys-General and Justice, to implement the RNS conditions in order to support the quality of interpreting required in our courts and tribunals.

Join us in this call for the systematic implementation of:

o  Briefings before the case commences (essential for interpreters to prepare for their work by understanding the context and detail in which they will be working)

• Information about the case must be provided to the LSP at the point of booking the interpreter/s, and the LSP must provide this to the interpreter/s as soon as they are confirmed.
• Failing the above, courts and tribunals must make time before the case starts for the prosecution (in a criminal case) or the applicant’s lawyer (in a civil case) to brief the interpreter/s. AUSIT can assist by providing a guide to the type of information which is essential.

o  Interpreters to work in pairs in hearings over two hours, and in all trials.

• When a defendant/accused does not understand English, the interpreter/s must render everything said in the court/tribunal into the other language, simultaneously. The cognitive and physical effort of this activity makes it impossible for one interpreter working alone to provide accurate interpreting.
• In these circumstances, for each language other than English (LOTE) required, two interpreters must be engaged to work jointly.

o    Access to the court/tribunal’s hearing loops (required for audio quality for simultaneous interpreting)

• Court/tribunal rooms where interpreting is required should have working hearing loops.
• Hearing loops should be given to interpreters before a case commences without the need for interpreters to request them.

o    Access to simultaneous interpreting equipment, allowing service provision at an appropriate distance

• Currently, interpreters in criminal proceedings must work simultaneously by whispering into the accused’s ear, as no equipment is made available to support this essential mode. COVID-19 has highlighted how dangerous and inappropriate this practice is.
• A range of solutions are readily available, including portable radio transmitters/receivers commonly used by tour guides in Australia and already implemented for court interpreting in the USA. These are inexpensive wireless devices that each court/tribunal could purchase as part of their technical requirements.

o    A workstation within the court/tribunal where the interpreter can sit comfortably, with a desk and access to the internet to consult terminology if needed

• This could be a table and chair in a corner of the court/tribunal. In other countries, interpreters have a permanent desk in front of the judge or at the bar table.
• Interpreters need to be able to access their mobile devices to consult the internet regarding any translation difficulty. If such devices are not allowed, the court/tribunal should make a computer with internet access available to all interpreters.

o    Regular breaks

• Breaks of at least five minutes should be scheduled every 45 minutes without the need for interpreters to request them, especially when interpreters work alone.

o    Access to all written material that will need to be sight translated

• A copy of any document that will be read out in the court/tribunal must be provided to the interpreter/s so they can sight translate it. The person reading it out in the source language should read slowly so that the interpreter can keep up, as it takes much longer to translate to another language than to simply read in the source language.

AUSIT calls for these basic conditions to be implemented in 2023 as a matter of urgency. Failure to do so may lead to qualified interpreters refusing to accept any further court/tribunal work, to the detriment of all involved.