Since When Has It Been The Judiciary 'changing' The Law?

[youngmafbog]

Unelected liberal judges deifying law to meet their own warped views.

How can this happen, I thought we lived in a democracy? Clearly not.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3824272/Knife-teens-spared-jail-troubled-home-Judges-told-consider-leniency-believe-help-reform.html

[Mamyalynne]

It's a relatively new body - 2010 I think.


https://www.sentencingcouncil.org.uk/

[mushroom25]

the judiciary are probably under intense government pressure to find ways of not adding any more inmates to the already overburdened prison system. this would probably be a manifestation of that.

[Gromit]

It is a consultation document. When the results of the consultation are known, then instructions will be sent put next year. This document is not the new guideline, and it will not be acted upon as it is.

Parliament makes the laws, but the judicary have to implement them, which is why they need to issue guidelines as to how the the law will work in practice. So they are not changing the wishes of Parliament, but working out the best way of delivering it.

[Old_Geezer]

Judges effectively make law by interpreting laws passed and thus making precedents.

[New Judge]

I don't often side against you, AOG, but you’re a bit of the mark with this one.

With a few exceptions (which do not concern us here) the only statutory stipulations regarding most criminal offences are the maximum sentences that can be handed down. All the rest is “guidance”. As far as the Sentencing Council’s (SC) guidelines go, judges and magistrates must sentence in accordance with them unless there are reasons (which must be announced in open court at the time of sentencing) to depart from them. Included among the guidance for most offences are (non-exhaustive) lists of aggravating and mitigating factors relating to both the offence and the offender. In this instance revised guidance for knife crime is proposed which will suggest more lenient sentences be imposed on offenders who have (what is euphemistically called) a “troubled” background. The law is not being changed or defied. Only revised guidelines are proposed and guideline revisions are published constantly.

Further, The Mail’s article contends that the SC is “dominated by judges”. This is not correct. The current membership of the Council is as follows:

Rt Hon. Lord Thomas, Lord Chief Justice, (president of the Council) – Judge
Rt Hon Lord Justice Tracey (Chairman of the Council) – Judge
Simon Byrne (former police Chief Constable) – Non-Judge
Mark Castle (Chief Executive of Victim Support) – Non Judge
Rosina Cottage, QC (Barrister) – Non-Judge
HH Judge Julian Goose, QC (Recorder, Sheffield) – Judge
Martin Graham (Probation Chiefs’ Association) – Non-Judge
Jill Gramman, JP (Magistrate) – Non-Judge
Rt Hon Lady Justice Hallett (Crown Court Recorder) – Judge
HH Judge Sarah Monroe, QC (Recorder, Portsmouth) – Judge
Professor Julian Roberts (Professor of Criminology at Oxford) – Non-Judge
Alison Saunders (director of Public Prosecutions) – Non-Judge
Hon. Mrs Justice Thirlwall (Midlands Circuit Judge) – Judge
District Judge Richard Williams (District Judge South Wales Magistrates’ Courts) – Judge

So, 50:50 judges (if you include DJ Williams, who does not wear a wig and gown and sits only in Magistrates’ Courts). You would expect something like the Sentencing Council to be composed of a number of members from the judiciary, but the current council is hardly “dominated by judges”.

Yes mamy, the Sentencing Council was formed in 2010. Its replaced the "Sentencing Guidelines Council" which had existed for many years previously. Not much changed in 2010 apart from the name.

[ABerrant]

By law the SC must consist of a majority of judicial members. (Magistrates are also judicial office holders.)

As per Schedule 15 of Coroners and Justice Act 2009, the Sentencing Council of England and Wales must consist of 8 judicial members (1 to be chair) and 6 non-judicial members.

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2009/25/schedule/15

The previous body, the Sentencing Guidelines Council, was created by the Criminal Justice Act 2003 and first met in March 2004. That council consisted of the Lord Chief Justice as chair, a further 7 judicial members and 4 non-judicial members.

Thus non-judicial members have increased by 2, cutting the judicial majority from 4 (of 12) to 2 (of 14).

[ToraToraTora]

judges have to much discretion and this sort of thing demonstrates it all too regularly.

[fiction-factory]

> I don't often side against you, AOG, but you’re a bit of the mark with this one.

I can't see AOG on this thread, New-Judge.

I'm not sure they are defying the law (nor worshipping or regarding it as a god) - I agree with the answers above, particularly NewJudge's especially informed response

[fiction-factory]

*worshiping*

[New Judge]

"I can't see AOG on this thread, New-Judge."

Neither can I now, f-f. Thanks for the correction. I'd like to blame it on electric soup but at before 3pm I think that may be a bit previous, even for me :-)

And thanks for the concurrence.

Yes I know Magistrates are judicial office holders, AB, but they are not judges. They are "lay" members of the judiciary. The Mail article stated that the SC was "dominated by judges".

[Peter Pedant]

// I don't often side against you, AOG, but you’re a bit of the mark with this one. // NJ

I do, YMF ( for it is really he) because you write an unending stream of crip that NJ has only just noticed, today on the subject of English Common Law

that is the law made by judges ....and they have done so since time immemorial which the law sets at ... 1189

In fact this is about sentencing - and the sentencing council was set up to rule out inconsistencies. As far as I can see they arent doing their job badly