Clause 17 - Chairman and deputy chairmen: selection
Courts Bill [Lords]
10:45 am
Mr David Heath (Somerton and Frome, Liberal Democrat)
This is a probing amendment. Who is this person acting on behalf of the Lord Chancellor who puts in his first appearance in subsection (3)? The Lord Chancellor is not only a person, but a Department. Anyone with authority in the Department forms part of the personage of the Lord Chancellor, so why do we need to specify an additional person only in this instance in the Bill? The Minister may be able to enlighten me about why that person must be empowered to act on his behalf in this particular function.
Amendment No. 123 makes a slightly more substantive point. Subsection (5)(c) sets out the rules for a contested election for the chairman or deputy chairman of the local justice area, and deals with the franchise for any such election. The terms in which the paragraph is couched are unnecessarily open to misinterpretation and dispute. Subsection (5)(c) states:
''the election is made by those experienced as lay justices in the local justice area''.
That term is open to various constructions. I should not like to determine who is an experienced lay justice rather than simply a lay justice. At what point does the term ''experienced'' come into play?
I would have thought, and my amendment would ensure, that the appropriate requirement is for someone to be assigned to and to act as a lay justice in the local justice area for which the election is held. The meaning of anything expressed more vaguely than that is open to challenge, and I cannot understand why the subsection is couched in those terms. The Minister may tell me that there is a very good reason why a lay justice must be an experienced lay justice, in which case he may be able to tell me by what criteria that experience is to be judged.