Incorrect Justice
In form this is a 4-Part Series on the Court of Appeal [Civil Division]. Someone reading this may form the impression that the Court of Appeal [Civil Division] is the only Division within the Royal Courts that dispenses “Incorrect Justice”. For real, the dispensation of “Incorrect Justice” has been a permanent feature of the administration of justice in England and Wales since the days of Halsbury LC.
This 1st Part of the Series introduces the issues that are distressing court users. The Court “system’ benefits legal professionals but not the clients of those legal professionals. The system does not recognise the legal or Convention right of litigants in person, to handle their own problems to the best of their own ability.
The Court system continues to treat Litigants in person with disrespect However, there are a few Justices still in the Court of Appeal [Civil Division] whose power of legal reasoning is first among equals. I shall be adverting to their contribution to jurisprudence in the course of this Series.
Incorrect Justice defined
“Incorrect Justice” means, “A Court’s decision or ruling or direction upon an Application Notice or Notice of ex parte application for permission to give notice of appeal out of time or Notice of Appeal, made by an unqualified or untrained person who, by false pretences or by deception assumes the persona of a Master, Deputy Master or a Judge, with the intention that his or her decision or ruling or direction would be binding upon an applicant or appellant."
Incorrectness, be it in an organisational or institutional setting, is a psychosis; namely, a psychiatric disorder, a delusion characterised by a loss of contact with reality, in the erroneous belief that one’s behavioural attributes, procedure, approach or interpretation of a set of rules, is the one and only rational method that would satisfy the criteria of acceptance in given circumstances..
In the context of the administration of justice, incorrectness is also an attribute of institutional behaviour, a delusion that judges and staff are upholding the “rule of law”, whatever “rule of law” means; or that judges and staff are not only learned, but are also versed in the intricacies of the logic of law.
It is difficult for anyone in control of their faculties to accept that the Court of Appeal [Civil Division] is in place to validate or vindicate the rights, freedoms, and entitlements of the individual court users and no matter the number of times that Judges take the judicial oath to well and truly serve the Queen and do well to all manner of people, the Court of Appeal is at a crossroad. It has lost contact with reality.
Overwhelmed
The Court of Appeal [Civil Division] is overwhelmed by its own sense of self-importance or self-actualisation. In the words of a Master of the Rolls:
“The Court of Appeal has been described as the engine room of our judicial system in England and Wales. It hears appeals in all our leading cases in civil and family justice. Its judges are concerned with upholding the rule of law. We are also concerned to do our best to ensure that our procedures are easy to access, and easy to understand.”
The “engine room” may have thousands of “engineers” ready to go into action, but the “engine” is rusty. That “engine room” is in need of law mechanics, to repair the broken, disjointed knots and bolts of the “system”.
As regards the claim that “its judges are concerned with upholding the rule of law”, that is laughable. There is empirical evidence that only a few of the judges [of the Court of Appeal [Civil Division] are upholding the rule of law”; notwithstanding that their definition of the “rule of law” differs from mine.
Figment of imagination
What then, if the “engine room” is fully stocked but there is no one with the requisite knowledge of stock-taking ? The thought that the Court of Appeal [Civil Division] is in place to vindicate or validate the rights, freedoms and entitlements of those court users who have a genuine grievance, is false.
There are six primary areas of concern to applicants for permission to appeal, where the court below has not granted leave and to appellants, as a whole.
• There is no apparent or ostensible transparency in the way that Justices in the Court of Appeal [Civil Division] arrive at their decisions
• The “Legal Assistance” scheme which justices of the Court talk about in glowing terms is surplus to the requirements of justice. The “scheme” has only succeeded in attracting glorified “lawyers” from the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal [AIT]
• The Registry of the Court of Appeal [Civil Division] regularly deceives court users into believing that their documents are passed on to a judge or to a deputy master in accordance with the rules, but in fact, bundles gather dust in filing cabinets.
• Applications and Notices from litigants in person are dealt with by members of the clerical staff in the Registry and by the [Interns from the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal – Ms Sally Meacher, Ms Lisa Smith, Ms Terry Young, to name a few of them.], This kind of nonsense has been exported from HM Courts Service to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, Section 4, [British Section of the Court] where Interns are also playing God in the Registry of that Court.
• The Court Procedure Rules - CPR [Part 52.16] provides that a Master or Deputy Master in the Court of Appeal, Civil Division, may determine
(a) any matter incidental to any proceedings in the Court of Appeal;
(b) any other matter where there is no substantial dispute between the parties; and
(c) the dismissal of an appeal or application where a party has failed to comply with any order, rule or practice direction, unfortunately, there is no Master or Deputy Master, with any grounding in law.
It is not even clear whether Mr. David Gladwell, who was described as “the Head of the Civil Appeal Office and Master” was indeed, qualified to practise law. He is no longer working there.
• Justices of the Court of Appeal [Civil Division] have been known to stage bogus hearing. [“Sir” Joseph Richard Buxton (71) who retired on 30 September 2008 staged such “bogus Hearings” whilst he was a senior Justice in the Court of Appeal
Problem
The real problem facing some of the judges of the Court of Appeal [Civil Division] is whether or not the saying that “to err is human” applies to them. A human being, no matter what his or her station in life is, should be able to correct any error or omission made in the ordinary course of his or her work. Even if it is not possible to make any such correction, there is no reason why a human being should think that he or she can never make a mistake.
In light of human frailty, judges and their staff make mistakes, misinterpret the rules or misapply statutory provisions or simply do not know that certain provisions exist. Yet, those judges and their staff are reluctant to accept that they are human, too, and that “to err is human”!
Next Incorrect Justice Part 2
Andre John-Salakov, Leader, PLC Party & Founder, The Public Law Centre [CSO]
INVITATION TO PATHFINDERS 