Underscoring the importance of introducing reforms in the judicial system, Vice President Manuel “Noli” De Castro has urged the Public Attorneys Office (PAO) to use technology to their advantage and to start building, cleansing and improving its database so as “to serve the ends of justice.”

De Castro made the call when he spoke during the 2009 PAO National Convention in Manila saying the reforms, such as improving its internal systems and procedures, would “greatly improve the dispensation of justice for the poor.”

The Vice President cited the fact that the world today has changed drastically due to the fast advances in technology.

“A decade ago, most of our offices have computers but are not yet fully interconnected. Today, every single PAO lawyer can be connected to one another and to your database. Today we have smart phones, cloud computing, wireless networking, flexible database architecture, and so on. Make use of these resources to serve the ends of justice,” De Castro said.

He pointed out that while technology provides tools, the database of PAO lawyers will serve as the brain of their system.

De Castro also suggested that PAO lawyers should start investing in a system or set of systems to improve their operating efficiency.

In particular, he said they may want to consider those that deal with case monitoring, case processing, document-tracking, and performance monitoring of lawyers.

Meanwhile, De Castro lauded PAO lawyers for assisting 9.2 million clients, handling 1,267,000 cases, and causing the release of nearly 169,000 poor inmates from 2007 up to last year.