Over the many years, there has been a large debate as to whether or not society in the United Kingdom are being judged fairly. In my personal opinion, we are not. The term ‘fair’ or ‘fairly’ in this instance and particular question however though, can be applied to many reasons as to why people do not feel they are being judged by an impartial system such as the individual characteristics of senior judges for example.
One example of one source that does not believe the judicial system of today to be fair is a source published by the Guardian and a legal correspondent called Owen Bowcott who is also the author. The title of the article reads that “Only one-quarter of Britons believe legal system is fair”. The article further down states that “only a quarter of the population believe that the UK’s legal system is fair and transparent according to a survey that was released by a legal law firm”. Bowcott also goes onto later on reveal that around “two-thirds of those questioned feel that wealth is now a more important factor in gaining access to justice than it used to be”. This statement from this article alone, gives us a large perspective as to whether or not the judicial system is fair as this quote states that being wealthy and upper-class are more important in the world today in the justice system which does not show much diversity.
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If we were to next look now at the actual judges that are in the United Kingdom, then we would be able to compare them to the stereotype that has been crafted over the years which is what they look like which is most of the time old, male, white and at least middle class. An example of one judge is Lord Justice Hamblen who is a current judge of the Supreme Court and also two of his colleagues, Lord Justice Leggatt and Professor Andrew Burrows. All three of these men, although not matching all of the stereotype’s characteristics of the appearance of a judge in the United Kingdom today and are all either male, white, elderly.
Going back to diversity now and if we were to look at the different types of courts in the UK that we have such, the High Court or the Court of Appeal, then we could look at the number of women who are judges there are as opposed to the total number of judges there are in the entire court itself and also its entire ethnic minority. According to judiciary.gov.uk, The High Court has a total of 12 judges where only one of them is a woman and the ethnic minority is white. In addition to this, the Court of Appeal has a total of 39 judges where there is only eight women and again the ethnic minority here is white. From these two courts alone, we can clearly see that there is no diversity whatsoever has it is not a close number at all in regards to the number of male and female judges in these courts and in both of these two courts they are dominated by a white ethnic minority. Also, in terms of district judges, there are 422 of them where again, the ethnic minority is white. As a result of looking at these numbers, we can clearly see that there are indeed too many males and nowhere near enough females in the judicial system. It is also important to consider the fact that all of the courts that we have looked at, that all of their ethnic minority are white. After looking at this in my opinion, it makes it impossible for us to even consider that the system that we are being judged by is diverse which is a huge factor tying into the actual question of whether or not we are indeed by judged by a fair judicial system overall.
Another source we can look at here once again comes from the Guardian and the author again being Owen Bowcott. The title of this article reads that “Judiciary needs to be more diverse” peers say. Further down the article a bit, it reads “targets should be set to appoint more women and minority ethnic judges if progress is not made within five years, a House of Lords committee recommends”. In this instance, this is a particularly intriguing and interesting quote to look at here as this article was published by Bowcott in March 2012. Now nearly eight years on from this article being published, we would have to admit here that these targets have not exactly been met at all as if we were to go back to my previous paragraph about the number of judges who were women and what their ethnic minority was, the numbers of judges who are women in these courts are still very low and the ethnic minority is still very much white. In terms of the diversity side of this, we can once again look here as Bowcott also states that “only one in 20 judges is non-white and fewer than one in four judges is female”. These are not diverse numbers at all which only adds more to the reason as to why I feel that we are not being judged by a fair judicial system.
One source that we can look at however though that not only tells us that judicial system, more specifically with how to do with how they are appointed is a journal called ‘Diversity in the Judiciary: The Case For Positive Action’ by Kate Malleson. A quote from the book that shows us this says “a range of policies has been developed in England and Wales to reform the judicial appointments process so as to promote greater diversity. But despite two decades of official activity, the pace change has been far slower than anticipated”. This quote here shows us that although there are actions being taken to make the judicial appointment process more diverse, over the span of two decades there is most likely still not being enough done as there most definitely should be to make sure the process is diverse which would ultimately ensure that the judicial system is more diverse and most importantly fair.
In terms of how people are selected to be in office across both England and Wales, this is done through the Judicial Appointments Commission or better known as JAC. According to judiciary.uk, the Judicial Appointments Commission is “an independent commission that selects candidates for judicial office in courts in both England and in Wales”. In regards to its background, the commission was set up back on April 3 2006 and put under the terms of the Constitutional Reform Act 2005. The purpose of the commission was in order to maintain and strengthen judicial independence by selecting the candidates themselves for the judicial office and out of the hands of the Lord Chancellor which would then as a result of this, then make the appointment process much clearer. The Constitutional Reform Act 2005 in addition to this, also helps to ensure that the appointment selection process is as fair as possible as according to once again judiciary.uk that this is an act that is a “duty on government ministers to uphold the independence of the judiciary, barring them from trying to influence judicial decisions through any special access to judges”. This is one of the few changes that this act has brought in. However, in this instance relating to the actual question of whether the system is fair or not, it is important to consider whether or not the act itself is effective on the system which in my opinion it is not entirely.
Going back to the journal ‘Diversity in the Judiciary: The Case For Positive Action’ by Kate Malleson, another quote that we can use here to help answer the question is where it says “Yet despite the two decades of official activity, the pace of change has been far slower than anticipated by many in the judiciary, the government, and the legal profession and there remains little prospect of any significant shift in the composition of the bench in the near future”. This is a seriously concerning thing as this quote from the journal shows us that even across the span of two decades, there is still a serious lack of diversity in the judiciary system across both England and Wales. It is also important here to consider the date that this journal was published in which was 2009. It has now been over another decade, and yet judging by my own experiences and research that I have done, there is still a huge lack of diversity that is being promoted across the judiciary system.
Another source that can be used to here once again comes from the Guardian and again Owen Bowcott. This is an article that is titled ‘White and male UK judiciary from “another planet” says Lady Hale. In this article, Lady Hale, the president of the Supreme Court in the UK, says that the judiciary needs to be more diverse so that the public feel that those on the bench are genuinely ‘’our judges’’ rather than ‘’beings from another planet’’. Further down the article, Bowcott goes onto reveal that in the interview that Lady Hale believes that a ‘more balanced gender representation on the UK’s highest court’. In addition to this, we can also see that she says that swifter progress promoting those from minority ethnic backgrounds and with ‘’less privileged backgrounds’’ is needed. Further down this article, Bowcott reveals to us that Lady Hale is the courts first president female since its creation back in 2009. From this alone, we can clearly tell that there is a lack of diversity and equality within the Supreme Court alone due it appearing to be male dominated in regards to its previous presidents. Again here, I feel that it is important to consider the date as to when this article was published which was only last the beginning of last year in 2019 as Lady Hale says that more diversity is needed within the judiciary system. From previous research above, it has become evident to us that change in terms of making the judiciary system more diverse and equal has been slow so over the space of just over a year, it is highly unlikely that much if anything has changed.
The Guardian and Owen Bowcott also once again provides yet another valuable source to us here as this next source, titled ‘Lack of diversity among senior judiciary' is “serious constitutional issue”. Further down the article, Bowcott talks about how senior judges have warned that ‘the senior judiciary is dominated by privately educated white men and may need ‘’targets with teeth’’ in order to improve diversity on the benches. This in particular, is a very important article to talk about as not only does it to reveal to us the issue that is the lack of diversity within the senior judiciary, but also confirms to us that once again, we can see that it is purely male dominated with no women and also about how they are all being privately educated which in regards to the appointments and how they are selected, it does not make it fair at all.
I myself a month or two ago, was given the chance to attend both the Magistrates and Crown Court in Swansea where I watched a few cases and also where I observed a few things for me in the end to take away to write up on about. These were observations such as who was sitting in the judgement section, what cases were being judged, how I thought they were handled, and whether or not I found the end result to be fair or not. During my visit to Crown Court I got the chance to observe a murder case. During the case I noted the judgement section in particular to be mostly male and elderly which is what beforehand I expected. I did feel in this instance that the judicial handled the case well and that ultimately the result at the end which they came to was fair.
In conclusion to the actual question however, I do not feel that we are being judged by a fair judicial system as ultimately, I do not feel that the UK’s judicial system is nearly as diverse as it should be as there are not enough women as there should be in the judicial, the ethnic minority is far too white and too elderly. In my opinion, this needs to change as it is seriously important as diversity in this situation is extremely important and massively affects how fair the system really is.
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