JERSEY COURT.—LEAVE. (Hansard, 7 May 1861)

MR. SERJEANT PIGOTT
said, he rose to move for leave to bring in a Bill to amend the constitution, practice, and procedure of the Court of the Island of Jersey. He should not have ventured on such a step had he not ascertained that there was no probability of the Crown taking the initiative in such a reform during the present Session, and there was not the least likelihood of any reform ever proceeding from that Court itself. The Court consisted of the bailiff, a salaried officer appointed by the Crown, and twelve jurats, who were elected by the parishes. The bailiff was the only member of the Court who had any legal education. The only qualification for a jurat was a rental of £30 a year, and the only disqualification the trade of baker, butcher, or brewer. Such was the Court which decided the most difficult cases. In 1846 a Commission inquired into the working of the Court as a court of criminal law; for the administration, both of the civil and criminal law, was in its hands. That Commission expressed its entire disapprobation of the Court, which it stated to be unfit, from want of legal knowledge, to administer the law; as being often guided in its decisions by party feeling; and as neither possessing nor deserving the confidence of the inhabitants. Since that time another Commission had gone fully into the subject, and in their Report they also described the Royal Court as incompetent, as characterized by a disregard of many of the functions confided to it, and as a tribunal in which "extortion, oppression, and injustice seemed ed to be an ordinary course of proceed- 1713 ing." The position of the bailiff was described as essentially vicious, the jurats as frequently judges in their own case as managers of the impô t, and the inhabitants regarded the Court as too weak to prevent "indecent conflicts of language and even personal violence" from being committed within it. As an illustration of the kind of injustice and oppression perpetrated under the existing system, he might cite the case of a gentleman named Dodd, who went to reside in Jersey a few years ago, and was wrongfully arrested for a debt of £800, alleged to have been incurred by him in England as trustee of an estate. He made numerous and unavailing efforts to procure his liberty—procured even an injunction from the Court of Chancery, which was disregarded—and was not discharged till three years had elapsed, when the Royal Court at length declared that he had been illegally arrested. Another case was that of Mr. Blunt, who went from Birmingham to the island, was arrested for a debt which he no doubt owed; he acknowledged the claim and endeavoured to obtain his discharge by passing through the Jersey Insolvent Court, and giving up all his possessions, but, because he was unable to give up a settlement which his wife had upon some property—a settlement which was not in his keeping, and which it was not in his power to deliver up—he was still a prisoner, and might remain so for life, or at least till released by the passing of such a remedial measure by that House, as he was about to ask leave to introduce. Any Englishman visiting the island might be treated as these two men had been; but, however great the injustice, there was no proper tribunal to which they could appeal for protection. He had presented a petition from an hon. Member of that House (Mr. Packe) who was entitled to a considerable tract of land in the island, which had come down to him from an ancestor who acquired it in the reign of Charles II. A house had been built by a taxpayer on a piece of waste land belonging to the estate, and had been let to a tenant. A writ of ejectment was brought to regain possession of the property, and in six months a judgment was obtained; such as it, was. The judgment was that a number of persons had obtained a right of common over the waste land, and that all these must be made defendants in the suit. As the number of persons who claimed the right of common amounted to about 400, and as they were 1714 unknown to the petitioner, who could not tell who they were, he was thus prevented from prosecuting his suit for the recovery of the property. There was what was called the process of partage in Jersey. It consisted in dividing among the children the property left by a father. The Commissioners stated that ten years was an ordinary time to be spent in this process, and one case was mentioned which they said might well have been decided by an arbitrator in twenty-four hours, but which had already occupied the Court for seventeen years. The only question to be considered at present was whether the reformation of such a system as existed in Jersey ought to be taken in hand by the Imperial Parliament or left to the States themselves? He ventured to think that the House would not leave it to the States to reform themselves, seeing that they had allowed those abuses to exist for so long a time. If the States had the least wish for reformation, they would have adopted some line of action long before the present time. It was quite evident that they had no intention to move in the matter; and his opinion was that, if the House of Commons did not give him leave to bring in this Bill, those oppressions, extortions, and acts of injustice would continue. If the House gave him permission to introduce his Bill, it would be the easiest matter in the world to constitute a Court founded in accordance with recommendations of both sets of Commissioners. The hon. and learned Member concluded by moving for leave to bring in a Bill to amend the constitution, practice, and procedure of the Courts of the island of Jersey.

§ MR. HADFIELD
seconded the Motion. He presumed that there would be no opposition to the first reading, and he trusted that before the Motion for reading the Bill a second time Her Majesty's Government would lay upon the Table Returns which he had moved for in the present Session, but which had not yet been produced. Those returns would reveal a state of things which would astonish the House. It was time that the petition of the inhabitants of the island should be complied with. At the present time some of the offices in Jersey were matters of sale. His hon. and learned Friend had stated sufficient to show the abuses in the administration of the law, and it was notorious that there was no protection for trust property. The land system was also very defective. He be- 1715 lieved that if some such machinery as that of the Irish Encumbered Estates Court were set in motion in Jersey the value of land would increase 60 per cent.

§ MR. SOTHERON ESTCOURT
said, he presumed that there was no intention on the part of the Government to object to the Bill being brought in. Any one who took the trouble of reading the admirably drawn report of the Commissioners would find in it a mass of astounding facts, with regard not only to the law but also to the Court which administered the law in Jersey. These facts called loudly for the interference of the supreme authority of this country. Before the last Commission issued he had received representations from various parties in the island disclosing a state of things which would appear almost incredible. These representations stated that suits were continued for a number of years, and continued under circumstances that left no hope to the parties of there being any decision within a reasonable time; that persons were put in prison without owing a farthing, and that there was no fair opportunity for resisting such proceedings. The rules of the Court were such as to put it out of the power of any person to interfere. Without intending any disrespect to the hon. Member by whom this subject had been opened, he hoped the Government would take the matter into its own hands, for it was really of a nature too important to be intrusted to any single individual. If a remedy were not at least attempted in the present Session, it would be a disgrace to the Legislature; and legislative interposition was especially called for at the present juncture, because, not only were the laws and judicial system of Jersey defective, but the supreme authority of Parliament was disputed in that island. Even if the existing evils were successfully dealt with, the Report of the Commissioners would remain an interesting and most curious record of a state of the law which was altogether anomalous.

SIR GEORGE LEWIS
said, he was not about to defend either the constitution or the procedure of the Court of Jersey, or the similar Court in the island of Guernsey. They had been condemned by more than one Commission, and if ten Commissions, composed of competent men, were appointed, he believed they would all be obliged to arrive at similar conclusions. If Jersey were an integral part of the United Kingdom, and the matter were 1716 ready for legislation, he should not hesitate to lay on the table a Bill dealing with the question. But the difficulty lay in the fact that Jersey was only a dependency of the Crown. It was a separate appanage from the United Kingdom, and it had not been the custom of Parliament habitually to legislate with regard to that island. He could not suppose that any inhabitant was so little master of his sense or understanding as to deny the power of Parliament to legislate with regard to it; but what was disputed was the power of the Crown by Orders in Council to make constitutional changes in the laws of the island—a point as to which doubts might be reasonably entertained. The residents were undoubtedly animated by feelings of great loyalty to the Queen, and of attachment to Great Britain; but they were also strongly attached to their ancient laws, absurd and inconvenient as these might appear in the eyes of others. The House had heard that evening of some islands to which the offer of an amended constitution was made, which they, nevertheless, unanimously rejected. Was it by any means certain that the measure of reform proposed by the hon. and learned Gentleman would meet with a more favourable reception than had been accorded to the proposals of the right hon. Gentleman by the Legislature of Corfu? Of course there was a limit to the forbearance of Parliament; and, owing to the increased number of English residents in the Channel Islands, consequent on the increased facilities of communication, the attachment to old customs no longer prevailed there to the same extent. He, therefore, regarded the question mainly as a question of time. A year had not elapsed since the report of the Commissioners was issued, and immediately on its publication he caused a letter to be addressed to the Lieutenant-Governor of Jersey, requesting that he would bring the matter formally under the notice of the States. No definitive step had yet been taken by the States, and his feeling was that if, after a due interval had been allowed for deliberation, the States declined to adopt any remedial measures, Parliament would then legitimately be called on to interfere. The introduction of the present Bill, to which he should offer no objection, would act as a seasonable hint; but he very much doubted whether the time had not yet arrived for peremptory action.

§ MR. COLLIER
said, that having spent 1717 some time in Jersey, and having made himself acquainted with the laws of the island, he must state his conviction that the laws in Jersey were worse administered than in any civilized country in the world, and that the Government might be called upon before the lapse of very considerable time to deal with the abuses.

§ MR. O'BRIEN
said, he had never heard a word urged in defence of the local tribunals of Jersey. Once when a native resident was defeated by the unanswerable case made out by an Englishman, he exclaimed—"Is it come to this, that a Jersey man is not to succeed in his own court?"

CAPTAIN JERVIS
said, he would only ask the House to remember that the Channel Islands had no representative in Parliament, and that they were consequently bound to deal tenderly with them. With regard to the islands, to which the right hon. Gentleman had alluded, power was given to England by the treaties of 1815 to amend their constitution; and if it were not altogether what it ought to be, it was entirely the fault of this country.