Today JUSTICE joins charities representing children and older people, people with disabilities, bereaved families and victims of torture; and organisations working on issues as diverse as housing, fair treatment at work and in healthcare, freedom of expression and privacy online to call on Peers to vote against significant restrictions to judicial review in Part 4 of the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill.
Today JUSTICE joins charities representing children and older people, people with disabilities, bereaved families and victims of torture; and organisations working on issues as diverse as housing, fair treatment at work and in healthcare, freedom of expression and privacy online to call on Peers to vote against significant restrictions to judicial review in Part 4 of the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill.
Judicial review is a legal process by which individuals can challenge decisions made by public authorities on the basis that they are unlawful, irrational, unfair or disproportionate. It is a directly accessible check on abuse of power, a means of holding the executive to account, increasing transparency, and of providing redress when public agencies and central Government act unlawfully. Part 4 of the Criminal Justice and Courts Bill proposes significant restrictions on the procedure for judicial review.
The effect of these proposals will be to suppress legitimate challenge; limit judges’ discretion to act in the public interest and shield public agencies from effective oversight.
Andrea Coomber, Director of JUSTICE said:
“Judicial review is one of the very few means we can challenge public bodies and Government departments which act unlawfully. We should all be watchdogs when the Government tries to rewrite the rules in its favour. Pressing ahead with these changes will shield Government – big and small – from scrutiny, will deprive individuals without means of an often much-needed remedy and will undermine the rule of law. MPs and Peers must act now. The ballot box should not be the only realistic remedy for unlawful public action.”
These proposals are not principally about the law or lawyers. They will affect decisions about the countryside, about schools, hospitals, our armed forces, police and security services; about housing, healthcare, education and transport. Ultimately these changes will affect how and whether Government will abide by the rules which Parliament sets.
The proposals will be debated in the Lords on 22 or 27 October 2014. JUSTICE encourages all Peers to support amendments tabled by Lord Pannick and others, designed to preserve the discretion of the court which may ensure that judicial review remains open to individuals without means and those who litigate in the public interest.
Read the joint NGO briefing for the House of Lords report stage here.