Crime and Courts Bill [HL]

Lord Woolf Excerpts

Monday 25th June 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beecham]

My Lords, this is a relatively simple amendment. It arises from discussions with citizens advice bureaux nationally which have pointed out that the practice of there being reception staff at county courts has lapsed in many places. I understand that in many courts there is staffing available for only two hours a day. In some courts there is no staffing at all now. Given the changes in the legal aid and advice system increasingly people are going to be finding their own way, unsupported, to the courts and will find little or no help or advice available. The purpose of this amendment is simply to endeavour to require that there should be an information service accessible to people at the courts, not necessarily provided by the courts. Citizens advice bureaux and possibly other agencies might well be interested in undertaking this responsibility It is surely important, particularly for those who find the whole process of litigation difficult, as many do, to have accessible advice at the point where it is most needed—that is, at the court door, as it were. I hope that the Government will look at ways in which this might be achieved, particularly involving the voluntary sector. It would ultimately assist the efficiency of the courts because otherwise, I suspect, we are going to get increasing problems, as I have already indicated, from the number of litigants in person. At least if litigants in person can receive some advice at the outset, it might ultimately repay itself in financial and other terms quite profoundly with a reduced impact on more expensive court time, which is better deployed in determining cases. I beg to move.

[Lord Woolf]

My Lords, I hope that what the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, is proposing here is given most careful consideration. In order to obtain what we all want—access to justice for the citizen—information is critical. In Access to Justice, for which I was responsible many years ago, I hoped that we would one day reach the situation where the courts’ role changed from what it had been in the past. In the past, its purpose was to respond to the litigant’s activities and not to be proactive. I urged that the courts should become proactive and the citizen who come to the court shall receive not only the judgment, which sometimes they would be looking for, but also guidance as to the most economic and efficient way of resolving their dispute. Information provided as envisaged by the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, could play a critical role in this respect. Commendably, following Access to Justice, some courts provided very good services of this nature. It is very easy, when one is forced to make the economies that the Lord Chancellor is forced to make, perhaps not immediately recognise that although the service is a modest one it pays for itself over and again. It is important to the possible litigant seeking from the court general guidance on the resolution of their dispute. I hope what the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, has proposed will be taken away and considered very carefully and sympathetically.

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[Lord Carswell]

Perhaps I might develop the point as I come to it. I have no experience myself of a judge taking ill and being unable to carry on, but I do not think that that really assists the argument.

It also applies—and I say this from my own observation—at trial court level, where it is most obvious. It is a significant factor in appellate courts. No doubt in the Supreme Court many cases are quite short—two days, sometimes even less—but there are many cases, and the most important and significant cases tend to be somewhat longer. If a part-time judge is unable to sit on these for practical reasons, and cannot pull his or her weight, then that judge is downgraded in the eyes of other people to being a second-string member of the court. That is no good for anybody.

Secondly, on the practical level a part-time judge would normally need some fixity of schedule, so that the rest of the judge’s life can be arranged. That is why a person is likely to want to be a part-time judge on, let us say, Monday and Tuesday of each week. The timetable would have to be juggled to ensure that the judge is able to sit on those regular days. Obviously difficulties would arise if for various reasons an appeal needs to be listed on the other days of the week, and of course that happens, in fitting in the appeals for which that judge’s particular skills are required.

It is not as easy as turning up on fixed days and taking cases on those days. I fear that it is bound to lead to a feeling that part-time judges are not pulling their weight. This is highly detrimental to collegiality, which is of prime importance on an appellate bench. It may be viewed—however unfairly—by others that that judge is not a proper member of the court. The judge may also feel, subjectively, concern that she is not fully accepted as a full member. That, although it may not be exactly the feeling held by the others, would undermine the judicial confidence which is so necessary for high-class judicial work.

It is important that we try to find ways of accommodating this problem and of using the talents of able women, of which I am very strongly in favour myself. It is important that we can work out a way of not confining them to the junior ranks where it is easier in practice for them to carry out their functions part-time.

A suggestion has been mooted by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, that one could do that by stages, for a woman. If she has family responsibilities at an earlier part of the time when she is ready for judicial life, then she could be appointed to a lower-tier court, with a clear assurance that when family circumstances change and she would be available for full-time work, she would receive proper and serious consideration for early promotion to the higher levels, and that that assurance should be fully honoured by those who are making the appointments. Paragraph 2 was a well intentioned attempt to facilitate women or other people by extending part-time appointments, but I fear that it did so in the wrong way.

[Lord Woolf]

My Lords, I spoke on the subject at Second Reading. What I said is on the record and I will not repeat it. However, I am most anxious that it should not be thought, as a consequence of my speaking in succession to the noble and learned Lords, Lord Lloyd and Lord Carswell, that retired members of the senior judiciary are against increasing diversity. I stress as forcefully as I can that the contrary is true. I know from the times when I was Chief Justice or held other senior offices that we did everything we could in co-operation with successive Lord Chancellors to improve the position. The message that became clear as a result of our efforts was that achievements would be brought by approaching the matter in stages.

The first step involved tackling those who were attending law schools in this jurisdiction and ensuring an egalitarian approach there. I am happy to say that if one goes now to the law schools of this country, one finds at least an equal number of women and men studying to become our lawyers and judges of the future.

The next stage is to make sure that any hurdle that can reasonably be removed is removed from the path of those who enter the legal profession. At the moment our task is to ensure that they realise that the opportunities for judicial appointments are greater today than they have ever been. The appointments system that we have will treat applicants on a totally equal basis irrespective of their sex and of any background that they might consider a possible handicap. The judiciary plays its part in ensuring that the message is heard by those entering the legal profession and by those within it.

On the issue raised by the amendment of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd, to which I put my name, it is no use putting something in legislation that will have no practical effect. I refer to part-time judges for the Supreme Court, because it seems it is here where the argument seems clearest. From my knowledge of those who might seek this judicial appointment, I can conceive of nobody who could not take a full-time appointment to the Supreme Court but might be able to take part-time employment there. Having made that proposition, I point to the nature of the Supreme Court and to its role in our legal system now that it has been established. It is the highest court we have, and it has the heavy responsibility of maintaining the reputation established by generations of Supreme Court judges, who in the past were called Lords of Appeal in Ordinary. The court is looked on internationally as one of the finest law courts that there is, and its decisions are treated with the greatest respect.

We must do two things. First, we must not fall into the trap of using legislation to make gestures. To put into this legislation a provision that refers to part-time Supreme Court judges, for the purpose of trying to give a message to those who might be coming through the system that they should seek to become a Supreme Court judge, would be unrealistic if it implied that someone of mature years—probably 60—who wished to be a Supreme Court judge could apply for the highest pinnacle of our judiciary on any basis other than full-time. If there is to be an educational process, it should take place at a lower level in the system. I urge the Committee not to put into the Bill a provision that will have the effect of offering part-time employment in the Supreme Court when there is no realistic possibility that there will be any candidate for that part-time post who could be appointed in the foreseeable future.

The result will be that people will say, “Look, in 2012 Parliament specifically passed legislation that was intended to make available to a woman the possibility to sit as a part-time Supreme Court judge—but nobody has done that”. It will not happen because there has never been a candidate who could apply to be a Supreme Court judge under present circumstances.

[Lord Goodhart]

My Lords, I have proposed the removal from the Bill of Clause 18 and Schedule 12. I make it clear that this is not done to abolish the provisions that are dealt with in Clause 18 and Schedule 12. Instead I intend to enable the Government to provide, in proceedings that are separate from the Bill, a better system for the extremely important issue of judicial appointments. The provisions included in the Bill are inadequate and unsatisfactory.

The Constitutional Reform Act 2005 was of great importance. It modified the functions of the Lord Chancellor. In fact, it not only modified the functions but completely altered them. It created a Supreme Court to replace the jurisdiction of the House of Lords. The constitutional importance of the Act was recognised by those who negotiated it and by many others. I am well aware of this because I was one of the Members of the House of Lords who negotiated the matter in detail. Others included the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer of Thoroton, who I am very pleased to see in his place and who was then the Lord Chancellor, and the late and greatly missed Conservative Lord Kingsland.

As far as I am aware, the Crime and Courts Bill is the first Bill to make significant amendments to the Constitutional Reform Act. Significant amendments appear first in Clause 18—although all that the clause does is tell us to go and look at Schedule 12, which is tucked away at the back of the Bill. It starts on page 167 and continues to page 201. It starts with the provision that enables any number of judges to be appointed to the Supreme Court provided the judges serving on the court do not permit,

“the full-time equivalent number of judges of the Court at any time to be more than 12”.

This is a very significant alteration to the 2005 Act. There should be no attempt to tuck alterations into the back of a much wider Bill such as this one. It is highly doubtful whether this particular alteration should be adopted at any time, and I agree with the proposal from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd of Berwick, to leave out paragraph 2.

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[Lord Falconer of Thoroton]

I support the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, in what he says but, as a matter of practicality, I recognise that we have to move on. The noble Lord, Lord McNally, is much loved around the House and a genuine supporter of sensible constitutional change. He was a significant supporter of the Constitutional Reform Bill in that he allowed it to go through in circumstances where it might not otherwise have gone through, so I have a particular personal reason for believing that the noble Lord is a supporter of constitutional change. It would be worth while if he could say something in response to the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart.

We are dealing with three tiers of part-time judge: first, the High Court of England and Wales; secondly, the Court of Appeal of England and Wales; and, thirdly, the Supreme Court, which is part of the UK judiciary. The average age at which persons are appointed to the High Court of England and Wales is between 45 and about 60. In the Chamber tonight, we have two former High Court judges. The noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Woolf, were both appointed at the age of 45, which is at the youngest end of the range.

In appointing women between the ages of 45 and 50, it is extremely likely that they will have caring arrangements. I know that from my own experience as someone at the English Bar and as someone appointing judges. The difficulty for people is in making a choice as to what they put as their priority. As the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, rightly said, the current attitude is that it is “full on” if you join the High Court and there are no dilutions. The consequence of that in relation to the High Court is that a significant pool of people who would otherwise be willing to be appointed is being lost. I know that from my own experience in appointing judges.

[Lord Woolf]

Perhaps the noble and learned Lord will forgive me for making this point. I am sure that his experience was similar to mine. Where a case was made by an applicant who needed special assistance because of personal circumstances, the system that we have had has always been flexible enough to allow us to make those special arrangements and they worked satisfactorily. We should acknowledge that and I suspect that the noble and learned Lord will endorse what I have said. If I have understood him correctly, he was indicating the contrary, although I am sure that he did not mean to.

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[Lord McNally]

My Lords, I feel like sitting down. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, was quite right; when he was Lord Chancellor and put through his constitutional reforms the Liberal Democrat Benches gave him full and consistent support. The brain power behind that support was my noble friend Lord Goodhart. I was the political organiser. As the noble Lord, Lord McAvoy, will attest, the triumph of ideals must be organised, so I share the pleasure in these reforms. I also think it is right—we will have lots of discussion about this—that the reforms, good as they were and are, are capable of being tweaked and improved in the light of experience. Therefore, I am grateful to the noble and learned Lords, Lord Lloyd and Lord Falconer, for setting the parameters of the debate, as it were.

Before I go into the detail, I wish to deal with the general point raised by my noble friend Lord Goodhart. I understand where he is coming from and the need to acknowledge the importance of constitutional reform. However, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, found from his own experience, the difficulty is getting parliamentary time to tackle this. You sometimes have to accept the necessity of putting very important issues into a broader based Bill. The Government are always faced with the dilemma—this is true of all Governments—of choosing whether to put provisions together in one Bill, as is the case here, or of delaying legislation on important and necessary reforms. We have chosen the former approach but the fact that these provisions are in Clause 18 and Schedule 12 does not for a moment diminish their importance. Wherever they sit in the Bill, I would expect your Lordships’ House to discharge its usual role in carefully scrutinising the Government’s legislative proposals. If there was any doubt about that, it should have been dismissed by the thorough way in which the House has filleted these proposals for two and a half hours this evening.

I turn to the merits of our reforms to the judicial appointments process and answer the concerns raised by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lloyd. His amendments would delete from the Bill the key measures to promote diversity and flexible working in the Supreme Court. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, said, “flexible” is the right word, not “part time”. Of course, we must ensure that the process through which our judges are appointed is fair, open and transparent. The longer I am in this job, the more I am in awe of the quality of our senior judiciary. They are a national asset and are respected throughout the world for their quality and independence, as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, said. However, this does not conflict with a requirement for greater diversity in the judiciary. Diversity in the judiciary is important to enhance public confidence in the justice system. The proportion of women and members of ethnic minorities is still too low, and this is particularly the case in the higher courts.

As the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, pointed out, progress in increasing diversity in the judiciary has been woeful and inadequate. We do not believe that we can rely on trickle-up. We consider that allowing flexible working in senior courts is an important reform to increase diversity, and that it will not detract from the principle of appointment on merit. I was recently asked by a very senior member of the judiciary, “Will our judiciary still be held in the same high esteem in 20 years’ time as it is today, if your reforms go through?”. I could look him in the eye and say “Yes, I believe that it will, but it will be a more diverse judiciary”.

The arguments made by the noble and learned Lords, Lord Lloyd and Lord Carswell, and by the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Butler-Sloss, is that flexible working in the Supreme Court is simply not practical, and that all judges of the Supreme Court need to shoulder their fair share of the business by sitting full-time. I simply do not accept these arguments. It is a judgment call, but we have no reason to believe that it cannot work to the benefit of flexibility and diversity. Regarding the virtuoso performance by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, I can see how he earned an honest crust at that game. However, the noble and learned Lord made a good point. Flexible working will not be compulsory but will provide flexibility and, as has been pointed out by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, and the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, the merit test would still be there. It is not a dilution but a move to greater flexibility, which we believe will allow for greater diversity.

Many of the arguments we have heard from the sponsors of this amendment reflect an outdated view of the family. As the noble Baroness, Lady Kennedy, explained so eloquently, we need flexible working not just to enable a woman in her 30s or 40s to balance her career with her caring responsibilities, but to enable women in their 60s to carry out caring responsibilities for teenage children. Equally, such caring responsibilities can extend to grandchildren, a disabled partner or elderly parents. As my noble friend Lady Falkner pointed out, we are not just talking about women but about ethnic minorities, and some of this flexibility will also apply to men who find the present system too rigid.

We need to allow men and women of all ages to meet such caring responsibilities and balance them with flexible working patterns. The noble Baroness, Lady Jay, and others noted that such arguments were put forward in the past to oppose the introduction of flexible working in other professions. It has been shown in the medical profession and elsewhere that flexible working arrangements can be readily accommodated. As I have said in this House previously, if anybody asks me what is the biggest difference I have seen, having worked in the Foreign Office and Downing Street in the 1970s and come back to Whitehall now in 2010 to 2012, I would say that it is in the diversity of senior advisers. If our Civil Service can achieve such diversity, why can the law not achieve it?

That is not to say that there will not be challenges in implementing this, and practical issues to work through in, for example, the listing of cases. However, we agree with the noble Lord, Lord Pannick, and the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, that these issues are not insurmountable. As he has indicated, most cases in the Supreme Court require hearings of only two or three days. As has been discussed, flexible working can take many forms, such as working during term times, or for nine or 10 months of the year, as the noble Baroness, Lady Neuberger, highlighted. Can I again pay tribute to her committee, which has not simply produced a report, but has kept on the case in terms of chivvying me and the Lord Chancellor in these areas? Moreover, if we are allowing flexible working in the lower courts, including the High Court and the Court of Appeal, the absence of flexible working in the Supreme Court could potentially deny an outstanding Court of Appeal judge the ability to consider applying for the Supreme Court.

I hope that the debate has, in a way, answered the concerns of my noble friend Lord Goodhart. These are important issues that are not to be taken lightly. I do not think that the House has taken them lightly but the case against the Government’s proposals has not been made—in fact, quite the contrary. The balance of the debate has been on our side.

[Lord Woolf]

Before the noble Lord sits down, perhaps I should mention the position of the noble and learned Lord, Lord Carswell. He did not want to absent himself from the later parts of the debate, but he had to return to Northern Ireland and has sent his apologies. I said that I would convey them to the House.

[Lord McNally]

Hansard will note that, with the full understanding of the Committee.

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[Lord Woolf]

Will the Minister bear in mind that it is very important that there is someone who can speak on behalf of the judiciary in Parliament? One of the changes that took place in consequence of the Constitutional Reform Act was that the right of the Lord Chief Justice, which had existed hitherto, to speak to Parliament on behalf of the judiciary on matters that affected the administration of justice went and we have this business of putting in a statement. That illustrates that the Lord Chancellor will be the spokesman who has to take parliamentary responsibility for the appointment of all judges. We know that sometimes it is very tempting for a Minister or even a very senior Minister to refer to unelected judges. It causes the judiciary grave offence that that should be said because judges may not be elected but they are appointed in accordance with the process laid down by Parliament and by Members of Parliament who, certainly in the other place, are elected. That responsibility means that Parliament is a place where in regard to these matters somebody has to be answerable. We do not want to see the Lord Chancellor no longer having responsibility for these appointments.

[Baroness Falkner of Margravine]

I have agreed with almost every word that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer of Thoroton, has said this afternoon but I am now surprised at his explanation for why he wishes to move these amendments with respect to what I think he implied was an abrogation of responsibility by the Lord Chancellor for the judiciary. I wonder whether he is familiar with those parts of the Constitution Committee’s report.

For other noble Lords who might not be, I will take just a minute or two to point those parts out. Looking at this part and pages 14 and 15, the Constitution Committee in taking its evidence found:

“This argument was supported by the previous Lord Chancellor, Jack Straw MP, who described his role in relation to the lower tiers of the judiciary as ‘ridiculous’. The Lord Chief Justice, Lord Judge, also stressed that the Lord Chancellor ‘has no input at all to make other than to be there to look as if he is making an input ... It simply suggests there is political involvement when we have tried to get rid of it’”.

The committee goes on to make the point at paragraph 32 that,

“The Lord Chief Justice has day to day responsibility for the judiciary of England and Wales: he knows what is required of judicial office at all levels. He is therefore better placed than the Lord Chancellor to make an informed assessment of whether a nominee put forward by the JAC should be appointed. Transferring the Lord Chancellor’s power to request reconsideration or reject nominations to the Lord Chief Justice would strengthen the appointments system”.

In conclusion, the committee finds that,

“there is indeed a need for the legal framework for appointments to reflect both the extent to which the Executive should be involved in individual appointments and the reality of that involvement”.

The committee makes one point which the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, made, that,

“The Government should consider whether the Lord Chief Justice will need additional support in order to take on this role”.

I think that point is well made.

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[Lord Woolf]

In taking that message to the Lord Chancellor, will the Minister also convey the message that, with great respect to the Lord Chief Justice, the Lord Chief Justice does not know all the people who will be appointed? He will know possibly a few more than the Lord Chancellor, but I suggest that just as the Lord Chancellor would have to rely on advice, so would the Lord Chief Justice.

[Lord McNally]

Certainly, I will make sure that the Lord Chancellor reads today’s Hansard. The point is that it is advice that comes from the process of the Judicial Appointments Commission. Just as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Falconer, wants the Executive still involved, I am not so convinced and, even more importantly, nor is the Lord Chancellor. As I have said, we both take a view about the separation of powers of which this could and should be a useful symbol: the Lord Chancellor of the day would not be holding on to a rubber-stamping exercise, he would be leaving it with the Lord Chief Justice of the day. This has been an interesting mini-debate, which I will raise with the Lord Chancellor for further consideration.