Supreme court of the uk

Introduction

UK has created a new Supreme Court and had transformed the judiciary authority from the House of Lords by creating a new Supreme Court in the UK; it happened first time in the history of UK this procedure was distinctive and democratic in the society. ‘‘The focal area of creating new court was that they wants the judiciary to act as independent body because before that the judges of the higher court worked both as a legislature as well as judges in the house of lords”, the main reason for creating a new court was that how fair it is for the judges to work as a judges in house of lords and as a officials in the parliament because the “state invest the judiciary in both parliament and in the house of lords and it put the independency and impartially of the court at higher risk. The other prospect at that period was invented that the decision made by the law lords judges might be challenged by the court of human rights on the basis of ‘fairness’ that they might be not be fair enough”. In June 2003 the press conference was called and the Labour party announced the plan to generate a new Final Court in the United Kingdom. The debate was quite contentious, it was shocking news mainly for the parliament and for the public because it was new judiciary establishment for everyone and the issue arose that the House of Lords existed for the last hundreds of decays and for them creating a new supreme court was dishonouring and demolishing the history. ‘‘The debate of having a new Supreme Court whose members would not be a part of house of lord considered the issue of unjust between three national legal systems”.

The judges in the UK has not got that strong power like the judges in the United States they got strong supremacy to refuse or declare or say no to the ‘statute’ if its making trouble or inconveniences in their work but in the United kingdom they haven’t got this power i.e. if the parliament is passing the statute and if the judge say I don’t think this statute should pass because it will create a problem or may be inconvenient for us in the future. The parliament will ignore the judiciary view and will do whatever they think is better because Parliament got the highest power. Judge has a very small room to fit in they will still apply the legislation if they think it’s not fair So, in simple words the law lords of the highest courts has no right and power to act in accordance to their convenience.

Here the subject is what made Mr Blair to separate the judiciary from the parliament. The reason Mr Blair come to this unexpected constitutional reform is the conflict of Article 6 of Human Rights Act 1998 (‘’The national court cannot ignore the 1998 Act if there’s a conflict between”) in Article6 its stated that Every one has a ‘‘Right to a Fair Trial everyone is entitled to an independency and impartiality”. So the question is how fair it is for the judiciary to work as a legislative in the parliament and as well as to perform their duty in the House of Lords as a law lords. “In 2003 the council of Europe has questioned from the British government it was a real shameful for the British government they have questioned about the position of the Lord Chancellor, Lord Irvine of Lairg, he was the senior judge and was also a cabinet minister and a speaker of upper house of legislative”. It’s the point of the justice and fairness it’s unfair for one person holds many powers together. We had Lord Chancellors from the 20 centuries, sudden change was quite scandalous. Now the Lord Chief Justice is replaced by the Lord Chancellor, he will be responsible to look after the work and the performances of the courts. Although the issue is not about the judges undermining expertise, performances of the work they do but it’s about the righteousness. ‘‘Impartiality and independency must be measured against both subjectively and objectively standards”. As it is been observed in ‘‘Findlay V United Kingdom [1997]24 EHHR 221 , Where a solider has challenged the court martial procedure on the basis that the senior officer arranged a meeting, he appointed his members and the junior officer who was under his order. Had power to break up an official agreement regarding the court martial”.

Hereafter, again in the case of ‘‘Morris V United Kingdom (application on 38784/97) [2002] ECHR 38784/97. In this case the applicant complained to the European court of human rights on the basis that in the court martial in his case, it was a violation of his right to a fair trial in Article 6 of European Convention of Human Rights”. In simple words there was no independency in the court martial, the two officers for specific purpose chosen were also in compatible with the court martial independency. The decision of the reviewing authority to change the decision of the court martial was also in compatible with independence.

The third intention is the new role of the Privy Council and transferring to the Supreme Court. ‘‘Moreover they will take all the devolution cases from the Scotland, N. Ireland and Wales”.

Finally the New Supreme Court is officially opened on the 9th October 2009 and there will be 11 permanent law lords and the cost of the building was aprox57 million.

Conclusion: −

• It’s only a debating question, its also difficult for Great Britain to abolish its conventions. This proposed Supreme Court may disturb the whole convention and political history but on the other hand the separation of the House of Lords will give the judiciary full independency to take the decision without any outside pressure but practically it wont happened.
• The new Supreme Court is not as powerful as the U.S is, because British is a unitary form of Govt. It will be so difficult for Supreme Court to get high degree of place in the society.

BIBLOGRAPHY

1. http://www.justice.org.uk/images/pdfs/supreme.pdf (i)
2. See http://medlibrary.org/medwiki/Supreme_Court_of_the_United_Kingdom (9/12/09)
3. V.Bodganor, Building the New Supreme court: National and Comparative Perspectives,[2005]Law Quarterly Review, p1,Westlaw.
4. Robert.W, Robert, W. ‘The New Supreme Court and the changes on the justice system, 2006, LIMUK 292
5. http://www.opsi.gov.uk/ACTS/acts1998/ukpga_19980042_en_3 (4/12/09)
6. See The new Supreme Court and the changes in the justice system, 2006 by Robert Walker
7. S.Roger;B Ruth, A Supreme Court for the United Kingdom Policy Paper Justice Nov 2002(The separation of powers)p.3
8. See Findlay v United Kingdom[1997] 24 EHRR 221 , Westlaw
9. See Morris v United Kingdom (App no 38784/97)[2002]ECHR 38784/97, Westlaw.
10. ee by Lord Bingham of Cornhill ; The Constitution Unit Spring Lecture 2002