§ 4.55 p.m.
§ THE LORD CHANCELLOR (LORD GARDINER)My Lords, I rise to propose to the House a Motion which I hope your Lordships will be willing to consider without Notice. The Motion is the usual Motion for the appointment of Appellate Committees.
Your Lordships will remember that before the war appeals to your Lordships' House were always heard in this Chamber in the mornings and until four o'clock, because the House did not meet for other business until 4.30. But when, during the war, their Lordships, perhaps 29 not unnaturally, wished to get home before the air raids started it was determined that they must meet earlier, and, despite the strong objections of the late noble and learned Viscount, Lord Simon, it was decided to appoint a Sessional Committee, the Appellate Committee. Since then, as your Lordships know, that Committee has heard cases in a Committee Room upstairs to which they are referred by the Whole House for inquiry and report; and then, in the mornings, after Prayers, the senior noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack moves that the appeal be dismissed, or as the case may be. There are, in fact, two such Appellate Committees. These arc quite distinct from the Appeal Committee, which hears Petitions for leave to appeal. The reason for having two Appellate Committees of which all noble and learned Lords qualified to be members are members, is simply to enable two cases to be heard by different Committees at the same time if the state of business so requires.
My Lords, the reason why no Notice has been given of this Motion is due to circumstances which have happened more than once in the past. Under the relevant Acts and Orders, the Appellate Committees may sit during and after Prorogation but cannot, of course, sit again once Her Majesty has opened the new Session until they have been appointed. There is an appeal which is in process of being heard at the moment, an important appeal, the>Attorney General V. Nissan, which has been continued since Prorogation and which should be continued again tomorrow morning before this House has sat again. In similar circumstances the House has thought it right to allow this Motion to be moved without prior notice, and I hope that your Lordships may be prepared to do so again on this occasion. The Motion is in the usual form, and I accordingly beg to move that this House, in discharge of its constitutional duty to act as the ultimate tribunal in appeals 30 from England, Scotland and Northern Ireland, orders that two Committees, each of which shall include all Lords qualified under Section 5 of the Appellate Jurisdiction Act 1876, as amended by any subsequent enactment, be appointed to hear, during the present Session, such appeals as may be referred to them in order to secure the due expedition of Public and Judicial Business; and that the Committees have leave to report to the House from time to time.
§ Moved accordingly, and, on Question, Motion agreed to.