INTERPRETATION (Hansard, 27 May 1970)

§ The Solicitor-General
I beg to move Amendment No. 38, in page 22, line 27, after ` court ' insert: ' (except where the context otherwise requires) '. The Amendment excludes the definition of the court as meaning the High Court or a divorce county court in those cases where the context otherwise requires. The need for the Amendment arises from the fact that in a number of the new provisions inserted by other Amendments which we are making, the word " court ", where it refers to a county court, will mean any county court and not merely a divorce county court.
The Amendment deals with the point raised by the circumstances to which I have just referred.

§ Sir D. Renton
I am puzzled, and I think that we deserve rather more explanation that we have had. We had the matter fairly clear in the Bill as it stood before this Amendment was suggested. Where we found that the court was given various powers—important and far-reaching powers, and many of them new—we understood that it would be the High Court which would exercise those powers, or a county court which had jurisdiction under the Matrimonial Causes Act, 1967. We are familiar with that: it means a county court having divorce jurisdiction, and not all county courts have such jurisdiction.
A county court having divorce jurisdiction must, obviously, have power to make the various orders which may be made under the Bill, far reaching though they are. According to the Amendment, as I understand it, any county court, not merely a divorce county court, will in various circumstances have authority to exercise the powers given by the Bill. I confess that, in the complicated context of the Bill, I am not sure what those circumstances are. The words except where the context otherwise requires involve a tremendous amount of research not only in the Bill itself, but in the lengthy Amendments and new Clauses being moved tonight by the Solicitor-General.
I hope that I am not asking too much, but I think that it would be helpful to the House and to practitioners to have on record exactly or in broad terms where it is that the context would enable a county court which is a divorce county court to exercise these important powers under the Bill. I have not given warning to the right hon. and learned Gentleman that I would raise this point, but to the extent that he can help us and get this on to the record it would be greatly appreciated.

§ The Solicitor-General
I want to be helpful. It would certainly not be courteous to leave the question where it is. The right hon. and learned Gentleman did not give me notice of this matter, but if he turns to the language of Clauses like Clauses 8 and 9 he will find examples there, and, it may well be, elsewhere, of the context permitting the reference to the court to be a reference to a 1963 court other than the High Court and other than a divorce county court. It seems on the whole a convenient way of dealing with this to make the provision, subject to the exceptions where the context otherwise requires.

§ Sir D. Renton
That is as helpful as far as it goes, but it makes me wonder why the Clause 26(1) could not have read, for instance, " The court means the High Court or a county court ", because that surely will be the effect. I think that it should be clearly understood that the county court is going to be able to exercise the powers given under this Bill. That is what it comes to, however much it may be hidden by the words, cryptic as they stand, except where the context otherwise requires ". I realise that it is too late to have this dealt with in any better way, unless a manuscript Amendment were to be accepted on Report, which, of course, would be within the discretion of Mr. Deputy Speaker, but it seems to me that the county court—and here I am not quarrelling with the right hon. and learned Gentleman—has got judges able and learned enough to deal with these matters, which are essentially the administration of the family law with which the county court is becoming increasingly concerned.
I am happy with the substance of this matter, even though I am not happy with the drafting or, indeed, totally happy with the presentation. However, I think that we have to leave it at that now.

§ The Solicitor-General
If one looks at Clause 26, concerning the treatment of the expression " the court ", it would seem, bearing in mind the considerations I have offered the Committee, that the language in the Bill without the Amendment would be to restrict that expression.