HOUSE OF COMMONS (REDISTRIBUTION OF SEATS) BILL (Hansard, 12 May 1958)

§ LORD SILKIN

I rise to continue the point that I made when the Bill was before your Lordships on the Second Reading and following the reply given to the Question which I put to the Government this afternoon. I still feel, having had the Answer to the Question I put, that on the whole we are a little misguided in making it essential that the Deputy Chairman of the Commission referred to in Clause 1 must always be a High Court Judge. The last thing I want to do is to make an attack on our Judiciary—that is not in my mind—but we are, it strikes me, making a rather excessive use of the Judiciary for lay purposes: purposes for which they were never appointed.

The reply to my Question this afternoon was that there were something like ten Judges—it was not easy to follow the reply, but I think it was ten Judges—who were, in one capacity or another, being used for purposes which were not directly associated with their particular functions. If this Bill is passed into law there will be two more. I would not tie myself to the exact figure, but the number is quite substantial. This seems to me a grave practice. Of course, it is very understandable that we should want to make use of Judges for all sorts of purposes, because they are men of great wisdom and understanding, and no doubt can render great service to any Committee to which they are appointed or over which they preside. I had the privilege recently of serving with a Lord Justice of Appeal, and I can testify to the great value that he was to the work of the Franks Committee; and I would have said that that was a perfectly legitimate use of a judge, as judicial questions were very closely involved. But in other questions, in lay questions, I doubt whether it is desirable to employ Judges to the extent that they are being used.

If we take this Bill, I wonder whether it is essential that a Judge of the High Court should be appointed as Deputy Chairman of a Boundary Commission. I realise the purpose of appointing a Judge—namely, his complete impartiality and the confidence he gives to all political Parties. I believe, as a matter of fact, that my own Party were somewhat instrumental in getting this provision into the Bill. Nevertheless, this is not a political question at all. We are all free to have different views about it, and I do not 193 suppose that my Party would be dogmatic about our having only Judges; at any rate, whether they are or not, I feel that it is a matter which ought to be ventilated. I could find for the noble and learned Viscount any number of people who could do this job with complete impartiality and ability, some of whom are in this House at this moment, and I wonder why it is really necessary to go outside the ordinary public and limit the appointments to Judges.

I have not moved an Amendment, and I do not propose to do so, because I do not think it is a matter suitable for Amendment, but I wish the Government would reconsider this matter. I would not necessarily exclude Judges, but I feel that other people would be equally capable of carrying out the task. There might be special cases where it would be necessary to have a Judge, but I would not limit the appointment to Judges. If the Government were prepared to reconsider the matter, that would be a very satisfactory outcome indeed. I would not press them to do so, but I thought it right that this point should be ventilated because there is this grave practice. The noble and learned Viscount will know better than anyone else that to take nine, ten or twelve Judges from the Bench and divert them to other purposes is not helping our Judiciary to any great extent, and in the long run it means appointing more Judges.

§ THE LORD CHANCELLOR

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Silkin, has raised an important point on which I feel very strongly, but at the same time I am in great difficulty. I should like to deal first with the general situation which confronts the Government. As the noble Lord knows, it is necessary constantly to find for various bodies chairmen who will have the complete confidence of the public. That is essential, and it must be a confidence which transcends Party differences and differences of creed and outlook. It is my experience—I do not know whether the noble Lord would agree with it from his experience in his Ministerial time—that this is of particular difficulty to-day, because the men we are looking for if we want somebody to do a difficult job are men in their sixties, largely in their early sixties, and it is a sad fact—I say it with a very full heart—that we are still suffering from the gap 194 caused by the casualties of the First World War. The number of those men, irrespective of their position, who would command universal confidence is limited by a reason which is not at all a dishonourable one. I say no more.

Therefore, we come to rely on those who command confidence from their position and status, and it is one of the features of our country, of which I am proud, that those who occupy high judicial office command that general confidence from the fact that they are Judges. That is why, when we are looking for someone who must be entirely impartial, there is a great demand for Judges. I do not think that it has anything to do with one Government more than another. I think that every one of my predecessors did his utmost, as I do my utmost, to prevent the demand from being too great. But that is the situation with which we are faced and I put it frankly before your Lordships.

As to the immediate problem, in this case the Commission has to sift evidence and act impartially; so, although its function is not strictly that of a court, it has a certain judicial character, and undoubtedly the experience of a High Court Judge would be valuable. There is this one more cheerful aspect: that although on occasions when a general review is taking place the Deputy Chairman may have to spend a considerable time on the work of the Commission and may have to be temporarily relieved of his ordinary judicial duties, the Bill, as the noble Lord will have seen, by general consent considerably lengthens the intervals between these reviews to a minimum of ten years. Therefore the lost judicial time will not be so great.

With that frankness which the House expects from him, the noble Lord has referred to the fact that his Party had been anxious that this step should be taken. That is so, and, of course, although it does not acquit Her Majesty's Government of responsibility, I think he would agree with me that, in electoral matters particularly, it is desirable to proceed by Party agreement where that can be done. That was an additional reason why I felt that I ought to accede to this request. The other reason, as I think the noble Lord is aware, is that in Scotland a Judge has discharged this duty since 1917 and that appears to have worked well.

195 Out of courtesy to the noble Lord, I wanted to answer his general and particular points, but I should not like him to think that because I have answered them and given him the reasons I am complacent about the withdrawal of judicial manpower. I am not. I am very anxious that it should be fully deployed on its proper work—which is deciding the differences between subject and subject and between subject and the State—and I shall take reinforcement from what the noble Lord has said to-day to stand even more firmly to my guns.