‘The government is pressing ahead with plans to limit how the public can legally challenge official decisions, despite fears it will damage justice.’
BBC News, 21st July 2021
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
‘Several Conservative MPs will be suspended from the Commons for a day and told to apologise for trying to influence a judge presiding over the trial of a colleague for sexual assault, the standards committee has ordered.’
The Guardian, 21st July 2021
Source: www.theguardian.com
‘The lord chief justice and senior president of tribunals want all judges to feel confident to speak up about any wrongdoing, according to a new whistleblowing policy unveiled this week. The 12-page Judicial Whistleblowing Policy: How to report wrongdoing document was published on the judicial intranet on Wednesday.’
Law Society's Gazette, 25th June 2021
Source: www.lawgazette.co.uk
‘The European Court of Human Rights has ordered the Government to pay €24,000 for non-pecuniary damage and €60,000 in legal costs to a social worker who was accused of professional misconduct by a Family Court judge in the course of a fact-finding hearing.’
Local Government Lawyer, 23rd June 2021
Source: www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk
‘The government intends to revisit the role of lord chancellor as part of a ‘careful review’ of the Blair administration’s 2005 Constitutional Reform Act, current incumbent Robert Buckland QC MP has revealed.’
Law Society's Gazette, 14th June 2021
Source: www.lawgazette.co.uk
‘Proposals to restrict judicial review are an affront to the principles of fairness and government accountability and should be dropped, a cross-party group of MPs and peers has said.’
The Guardian, 2nd June 2021
Source: www.theguardian.com
‘Talk is cheap. Governments, particularly wealthy, western ones, have been quick to make promises on climate change. They swear blind that they understand the threat the world faces, and that they will implement a policy response commensurate with it. Few nations have adopted this rhetoric as determinedly as the UK, with the British government promising to transform the UK into a net-zero country by 2050, an oath enshrined in law through the passing of the Climate Change Act 2008 (Order 2019) by Parliament in the summer of 2019.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 27th April 2021
Source: ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘A group of serving judges has called on the justice select committee to conduct a “wholly independent audit” of discrimination in the judiciary.’
Litigation Futures, 26th April 2021
Source: www.litigationfutures.com
‘Boris Johnson’s government takes the view that ours is a time of judicial overreach, necessitating redress in terms of the balance of judicial and executive power. This seems to have been driven by a number of high-profile cases, certain vocal thinktanks which appear to have the ear of government, and a wider constitutional prospectus of enhancing executive power to the detriment of the other branches of state. An endless series of projects and proposals have emerged, designed to remedy the perception of an overmighty judiciary. The Independent Review of Administrative Law, established with a view to curbing the perceived excesses of judicial review, reported recently in relatively tame terms, only to be swiftly followed by a further set of proposals. The Independent Human Rights Act Review potentially paves the way for satiation of long-held Conservative fantasies of amending the Human Rights Act. There are also, if leaks are to be believed, proposals to reform the UK Supreme Court.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 21st April 2021
Source: ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘Lady Justice Rose has joined the supreme court, doubling the number of female justices in the UK’s highest court in an appointment that has failed to quell concerns about lack of diversity.’
The Guardian, 19th April 2021
Source: www.theguardian.com
‘The Independent Review of Administrative Law has now reported. For a review process that was unnecessarily quick, the Expert Panel, led by Lord Faulks QC, has produced a substantial and detailed analysis. The Report has rightly drawn broad support from across the political spectrum—even if the Government’s support for the report has been accompanied by a new consultation which departs from the Report’s findings on various important points. No doubt, the focus will now shift to the new consultation. However, in this post we want to respectfully take issue with one of the firm conclusions of the Panel: that Cart judicial reviews ought to be discontinued on the basis they are a disproportionate use of judicial resource.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 29th March 2021
Source: ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘The operation of the Human Rights Act 1998 (the “HRA”) is currently being reviewed by the Government’s Independent Human Rights Act Review (the “Review”). One of the Review’s key themes is “the impact of the HRA on the relationship between the judiciary, the executive and the legislature”. In respect of this theme, the Terms of Reference ask how s.3 has operated and whether it should be amended or repealed.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 24th March 2021
Source: ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘The Ministry of Justice has launched a consultation on giving the courts the power to suspend quashing orders, removing so-called “Cart judgments”, and introducing a series of changes to civil procedure rules, following recommendations by the Independent Review of Administrative Law (IRAL) led by Lord Faulks QC.’
Local Government Lawyer, 19th March 2021
Source: www.localgovernmentlawyer.co.uk
‘The Supreme Court has come under significant criticism for its handling of the Shamima Begum case, decided on 26 February. Much has already been said in relation to the deference that the court showed to the executive, with some arguing that it was improper or even a complete abdication of the judicial role itself. This post seeks to clarify what precisely the court did and did not do in relation to the exercise of its constitutional duty to review the legality of executive action. It will suggest that the Court did not engage in any strong deference as to the nature of Begum’s rights nor to the balance to be struck between those rights and the common good. Such questions remained wholly within the purview of the Court. While the Court did pay due respect to the executive’s authority to determine and pursue the common good, this was subject to an assessment of lawfulness. Any deference, if it can even be called deference, was to the rule of law, given both the statutory scheme in question and the common law distinction between review and appeal. The determination of the scope of individual rights entails an exercise of judicial interpretation which seeks to strike an appropriate balance between the applicable legal considerations. It is not deference for the court to include constitutional principles such as the separation of powers within those considerations.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 17th March 2021
Source: ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘No doubt much will be written on the Supreme Court’s Shamima Begum ruling handed down on 26 February. The ruling has a number of notable features. In particular, a high level of deference was afforded to the executive which seems to contrast with the Supreme Court’s approach in high profile constitutional cases of recent years (such as, for example, in the Miller cases). A key feature of this deference is that it is offered in a national security context, where judicial deference has often played a role. This deference is partly justified by the Court on the grounds that Ministers are democratically accountable for national security decisions. However, as this post argues, the extent to which democratic accountability is a legitimate ground for judicial deference to national security decisions is questionable in light of current UK practice. This post raises three difficulties with relying on democratic accountability as a ground for deference in the UK national security context.’
UK Constitutional Law Association, 9th March 2021
Source: ukconstitutionallaw.org
‘On 26 February 2021, the Supreme Court refused permission for Shamima Begum to return to the UK. The Supreme Court judgment in the high-profile case of the British woman who left the UK as a 15-year-old girl to travel to Syria to join the so-called Islamic State, however, resulted in the Court effectively washing its hands of the case staying it until a full hearing can occur in future—a remote possibility. In the judgment, Lord Reed held the Court of Appeal was in error by substituting its own view of the balance to be struck between national security and the applicant’s rights. In so doing, the Court of Appeal did not give the Secretary of State’s assessment due respect. In this brief post, I wish to focus on a principal aspect of the Supreme Court’s judgment: the concept of deference.’
Oxford Human Rights Hub, 8th March 2021
Source: ohrh.law.ox.ac.uk
‘The mandatory retirement age (MRA) for judges is to be raised from 70 to 75 to deal with shortfalls in judicial recruitment, the government has decided.’
Litigation Futures, 9th March 2021
Source: www.litigationfutures.com
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