Clause 2 - Membership of the Commission
Justice (Northern Ireland) Bill [Lords]
11:00 am
Mr John Spellar (Minister of State, Northern Ireland Office; Warley, Labour)
Again, from the point of view of the commission, and lawfully trying to achieve a reflective commission, I keep coming back to whether the right hon. Gentleman thinks it would be desirable to have a completely unreflective commission. In the same way, we may consider the parallel between the laws of chance and the laws of probability.
The right hon. Gentleman takes the example of the involvement of women in the law. I fully understand that, historically, the legal profession has contained a high percentage of males and that a limited number of women moved up through it. As the number of women engaging in the legal profession has increased, we would think it slightly odd if, for example—I am in no way suggesting that this is the exact situation—that was not reflected in appointments as people move up through the system.