Brussels court hearings held at 10°C after heating breaks down

The French-speaking commercial court in Brussels has held hearings this week at temperatures of around 10°C after the heating broke down, according to court president Pierre-Yves de Harven.

While the court did not cancel its hearings on Wednesday so as not to impact the cases on the docket, if the problems are not resolved soon, hearings may be postponed.

“We are holding out as long as we can, but we cannot do so indefinitely,” said de Harven. “If it continues to be too cold, we will have to cancel.”

According to de Harven, the problems were noticed in the week of 29 December but the Buildings Agency, BNP Paribas Fortis - the owner of the building on Place Louise - and the maintenance services are reportedly refusing to take responsibility and are passing the buck to each other.

De Haven said the problems mainly occur in the courtrooms on the first two floors, where temperatures on Wednesday morning reached 10°C. On Thursday morning, 63 cases were scheduled in just one of the affected court rooms.

“This is not an isolated problem,” de Harven said, adding that difficulties are also mounting in other buildings belonging to the justice ministry.

Problems with the heating were also identified in the court buildings in Forest in December. De Harven asked eight employees there to work from home on Monday when the temperature in the building dropped to 14°C following a heating failure, which has since been resolved.

In addition to heating issues, one of the lifts in the building at Place Louise has not been working for more than 10 months, while another lift that takes people to the garage or the archives breaks down regularly, occasionally trapping staff inside.