In Malta the members of the judiciary are those serving Judges and Magistrates appointed to sit in the Superior and Inferior Courts in terms of the provisions of Chapter VIII of the Constitution. Although the judicial system, that is the set up of courts and tribunals intended for the resolution of legal disputes, provides for other offices – for example Commissioners for Justice, Adjudicators (who sit in the Small Claims Tribunals), arbitrators, assistants (who sit with a Magistrate in the Juvenile Court) – only the Judges and Magistrates appointed in terms of the Constitution can be referred to, collectively, as the Judiciary. 

 

Even retired Judges and retired Magistrates, who may be appointed to preside over certain tribunals, are not members of the judiciary for the purposes of the Constitution. Likewise, a Maltese citizen appointed to sit on an international court or international tribunal does not, by virtue of that appointment, become a member of the judiciary under Maltese law unless prior to that appointment he or she was a Judge or a Magistrate in terms of Articles 96 or 100 of the Constitution.