I was due to sit yesterday, as chairman of a GAP court. Yes, it's new to me too, but it stands for Guilty Anticipated Plea, which gives the court and the CPS an opportunity to allocate the proper resources without wasting too many people's time.
I was unavoidably delayed on my way to court, and since we had a full list of cases, it was decided to carry on with one of my wingers in the chair until I could arrive.
Turning up late is never easy - just popping your head round the door with a cry of "hi, guys" isn't right, so I despatched someone to warn the legal adviser that I was there. So far, so fairly normal, and the bench retired to reconvene with yours truly in the middle chair.
The morning proceeded with its busy list of sentencing and allocation cases, and then we had a break while the new-fangled computerised displays proved too much for the CPS and the usher (to be fair their training was pretty sketchy).
My colleague K who had sat in was greatly relieved to see me, but when I spoke to the other winger and the clerk, they both said that things had gone just fine, including a couple of tricky cases. So over coffee I gently asked her why she had never put her name forward as a chairman. "Oh" she said "I have never had the confidence". Her 40 minute leap into the deep end has changed her mind, and she will now apply for chair training.
Twenty years ago it was practice, in a quiet (perhaps traffic) court to put a winger in the chair straight after lunch with no warning, thus giving them no time to become nervous. Rules now forbid that, but that was probably a retrograde step.
I have informed the Justices' Clerk that there is a potential chair taker among us, so it is now out of my hands. I wish her well.
It's permitted for an untrained magistrate to take the chair when there is no trained magistrate available? How unusually pragmatic...
ReplyDeleteI had exactly the same thought - it is strictly forbidden on our county bench, and normal practice if a chairman doesn't turn up is to borrow one from another court (or wait until the tardy chair or a last-minute replacement turns up).
ReplyDeleteI too well remember those long hot summer afternoons in traffic or council tax courts when the chairman would wait until there were no more attenders, then - with the agreement of the legal adviser and prosecutor - turn to one of the wingers and say 'right you take over now'. Even handling postal pleas or proved in absences was good training, and gave us young wingers the chance to speak in court and take some semblance of control. Alas, the powers-that-be eventually decided it was Not a Good Thing, and a practice note went out forbidding it in future.
I hope your colleague fares better than those on our bench who want to train as chairman - there have been none appointed for four years, as we are top heavy (in the good old days you automatically qualified for training after five years) with chairs, and the selection process for the few places that do come up through retirement, illness or worse is now as tough as being selected for the magistracy was.
"Rules now forbid that, but that was probably a retrograde step." I agree. I've allowed wingers in a RTA court dealing with written guilty pleas (no one else in court) to make the pronouncements from the wing to get a taste of what it's like.
ReplyDeleteBiscuit.
Interesting, but I must say I'm surprised. Although it may be pragmatic and a good way to 'blood' potential Chairs it most certainly would not have been allowed in my neck of the woods. I recently floated that very idea on a 'no attendees, traffic afternoon' in order that a potential chair could 'hear herself' sentencing in the court room and was told very firmly that this was not allowed. I accept that a GAP court and a traffic sentencing court are very different but still don't think it would have allowed.
ReplyDeleteNot allowed ? By whom ? And with what authority ? Don't be a walking algorithm.
DeleteMy God what a farce.
ReplyDeleteSurely there has to be room for common sense to be applied in emergency.
So if no trained chair appears what is to be done? Adjourn everything..... I don't think so!
If that happened there would be even more trouble. Yes, it would be nice if everything worked according to plan but sometimes it doesn't . So when it does you do need room for maneuvre
Unlike when I was appointed "common sense" is no longer a requirement for the job.
DeleteThe Rules - www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2005/553/contents/made - actually are quite pragmatic about this. Firstly, Rule 4 allows someone who is not on the list of approved chairmen to preside in court provided (a) they are being supervised by an approved chairman and (b) they have completed the prescribed chairmanship training. Secondly, if no approved chairman is available, Rule 15 allows the “justices present” to appoint one of them to preside provided (a) they believe the appointee to be suitable and (b) the appointee is undergoing or has completed chairmanship training. Thirdly, if necessary because there is no training/trained justice present, Rule 15 allows an untrained justice to be appointed on the basis of suitability alone.
DeleteIncidentally, some comments here appear to see the roles of presiding in court and of making pronouncements as indivisible and required always to be done by the same person. They do usually go together, true, but is there any provision in law that says it must be so? As long as it remains clear who the presiding justice is, why should he/she not invite a winger to make the agreed pronouncement(s)?
The 'presiding justice' has no powers whatsover which are not held by and with his/her two colleagues equally.
DeletePrimus inter pares, yes.
DeleteWhich is, I confess, why I get (foolishly, I know) irritated when sitting on the wing with a Chair of the opposite gender, and the Bench is addressed by advocates as "Ma'am".
No, the Bench is not "Ma'am". It is "Your Honours" or "Your Worships", or even "You Lot". It is not a single person.
As I recall my training it was mostly about how to speak in public which I had been doing outside court very successfully for years. With about seven years on the bench the two days of training I had were not going to teach me much about how to 'manage' the court that I hadn't already seen and should already have known.
ReplyDeleteHis action was not only pragmatic but perfectly sensible and if other benches don't allow it, they should. Not only was there another winger present but also a legal advisor both of whom I'm sure would have given whatever help the would be chairman might have needed.
I had the same experience when I had only sat a few times. They were both courts devoid of members of the public and advocates and it gave me a taste of sitting in the middle. However, it was a completely different experience when I started chairing officially and had a full audience!
ReplyDeleteI routinely ask wingers to sentence traffic cases where the defendant doesn't attend. Otherwise, it's a total waste of their time.
ReplyDeleteSlightly OT but my bigger bugbear was when I was appraising a winger from the Chair and despite the other winger being an Approved Chair, they refused to take the centre seat on my offering it to them so that I could concentrate on the appraisal. Good thing I can multitask eh?? :-)
ReplyDeleteWhat did I comment earlier on "common sense".
DeletePersonally, I prefer to do winger appraisals from the chair - although I accept we're all different. It is not always possible to hear any exchanges between the winger under appraisal and the chair from the other wing. Neither situation is perfect though.
DeleteLike so much of our society these days our institutions are well behind the time.
ReplyDeleteThe court are starting to neither serve justice or the community, especially the civil courts which most mere mortals cannot afford to engage in.
Politics is run by a reabble of incompetent arseholes interspersed with the odd do gooder trying their best in a sea of sharks. And there are far too many MPs
A House of Lords is full of yesterdays men and women who are passed their sell by date and the cost of keeping nearly 1000 of them going when we cannot pay for medicine for the ill is truly shocking.
If Mr Cameron could just get his finger out of his a*** and shake things up a bit maybe respect might start to come back- I know unlikely!!!!
Boundary reform which reduces the number of MPs from 650 to 600 is already enacted and will come about in 2018. This would have happened in 2013 if the Lib Dems hadn't been blocking it (to gain an undemocratic advantage.)
DeleteSoon the number is reduced the better. In additon it's about time something was done about the house of lords which is now just a farce stuffed with old buffers past their sell by date. We need to have governemnt from younger current people not old farts
DeleteThat is a cretinous remark. There's a great deal to be said for having people with a lifetime of experience scrutinising our legislation in the second chamber.
ReplyDeleteI can tell by your comments that you haven't watched any debates in the House of Lords - the standard of debate is usually very high and the contributing members are usually very well informed indeed.
I will let 'cretinous' through, just this once. This is a polite and friendly blog, please keep it that way.
ReplyDeleteApologies Bystander, I'm afraid I got a bit annoyed by Anonymous writing off anyone elderly from being able to contribute to politics. Won't happen again.
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