Legal Village

Dodgy donations, flummery and judicial independence

Posted 6/12/2007 by Mike Semple Piggot

It is difficult to know where to start. In recent weeks we have had 25 million records lost by HM Revenue & Customs, the Northern Rock crisis, 'Donorgate', another escaping foot and mouth virus from Purbright, Judge Cottle deciding that the law banning fox-hunting was difficult to implement and the Bar Council reporting the result of a survey to retain horsehair wigs, silk and subfusc robes.

We also had the publication of the Lord Neuberger report on ‘Entry to The Bar’ – a document running to well over 200 pages and 14 appendices. I will have to return to a detailed analysis of this in my next post insofar as it relates to the Bar Vocational Course and the needs of the providers and profession.

Wigs and gowns
So we now have the prospect of barristers retaining their wigs and gowns from a bygone era and a new-look judiciary without wigs and new gowns. Geoffrey Vos QC reports: “It is quite clear from the large number of responses to the consultation that there are strong views on both sides about the retention of wigs and gowns. However, our consultation indicates a desire to maintain the status quo and for our historic traditions to continue to play a part in the civil justice system.” 

Chairman-in-waiting Tim Dutton QC states: “Our court dress is a hallmark the world over of the Bar of England and Wales. We must, as the survey indicates, be very careful to maintain the dignity of the process.”

Retention of wigs and court dress was particularly supported for serious cases where a loss of liberty was at stake. It will be interesting to see how the Lord Chief Justice copes with the Bar’s desire to maintain the status quo. Given that we have serious issues of prison overcrowding restricting judicial powers of sentencing and a continuing dispute between the judiciary and the Ministry of Justice on funding of the court service and judicial independence, how people dress up for court may seem not to be the most pressing item on the agenda. If the Bar wishes to retain wigs, gowns and other 18th century paraphernalia, why not?

Hunting
I don’t have any desire to hunt foxes, nor do I feel the need to shoot birds, stalk my evening meal with a rifle or kidnap fish with a fishing rod. But others do and the ban on fox-hunting continues to be unpopular, while resistance to the legislation by pro-hunting groups is unlikely to go away.

The other day, Judge Graham Cottle upheld an appeal from the first huntsman to be convicted of breaching the Hunting Act. Whatever the merits of allowing fox-hunting or banning it, the position after this case is clear – the law lacks clarity, is too broadly drawn and, as Judge Cottle stated in press reports, “the result is an unhappy state of affairs which leaves all those involved in a position of uncertainty”.

Dodgy donations
A rather more narrowly defined set of laws, introduced by the Labour Government, relates to the declaration and registration of donations to fund political parties. Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor Jack Straw had to tell the House of Commons this week that he did not know if the £650,000 ‘illegal’ donations had been returned or if the money was still in Labour Party coffers.

Section 58 of the Political Parties, Elections & Referendums Act 2000 makes it reasonably clear, given that the Labour Party has not returned the illegal donation within the 30-day time-limit, that “the court may, on an application made by the Commission, order the forfeiture by the party of an amount equal to the value of the donation”. S58(4) states: “An order may be made under this section whether or not proceedings are brought against any person for an offence connected with the donation.”

No doubt the Commission is busy preparing an application to the court. The press, political bloggers and commentators continue, in the meantime, to hunt for heads to roll.

Judicial independence and flummery
Frances Gibb, writing in The Times, reports that the Lord Chief Justice will appear on 6 December before the House of Lords Select Committee on the Constitution. Judicial independence will be maintained, of course. Gibb points out: “Lord Phillips put it like this: ‘Individual judges cannot be held accountable either to Parliament or to the executive in the 'sacrificial' sense, whereby their judicial office is put in peril and they cannot be externally accountable for their decision.’.”

Sir Igor Judge, to bolster the independence issue, is reported in The Times as saying: “Judicial independence and proper funding for judges was something that belonged to the people. We do not sit in flummery, saying that judicial independence is for our own sake.” It was important, he said, for “every single member of the community”.

It is a long time since I have seen the word ‘flummery’ used.  I looked it up on Google.  This is the result:

-noun

1. oatmeal or flour boiled with water until thick;
2. fruit custard or blancmange usually thickened with cornstarch;
3. any of various dishes made of flour, milk, eggs, sugar, etc;
4. complete nonsense; foolish humbug.

As a member of the community I am reassured about sitting in flummery, on all four counts above, by Sir Igor Judge’s statement.

A bit of a potpourri this week on some of the issues occupying the profession and the judiciary. My next post will be about the effect the Lord Neuberger report on Entry to the Bar may have in relation to the Bar Vocational Course if the recommendations are adopted by The Bar Standards Board ‘root and branch’ review of the BVC.

In my other guise as a blawger I could not but help thinking this week about the German word schadenfreude – or the English ‘equivalent’, epicaricacy. Tony Blair must be enjoying a moment of epicaricacy over Donorgate and Gordon Brown being described by David Cameron in PMQs as ‘the man in the canoe’.