The Appointment of Judges

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The Appointment of Judges

Judges can be split into two categories; superior and inferior.

Although each judge has a different role in their own court all

appointment of judges goes through the Lord Chancellor, currently Lord

Falconer. But whether the appointment of judges is a fair process or

not is a topic of interest and certain biases have been shown to

exist.

For superior judges (Law Lords, Lord Justices of Appeal and Puisne

Judges) it is the Lord Chancellor that actually selects them and does

the appointing. However this has been shown to be an unfair process.

There is an ‘Old Boys Network’ which basically means that if you are a

friend of, or are known to the Lord Chancellor you have a higher

chance of being selected as a judge. Obviously this is extremely

unfair, as it has nothing to do with people’s ability and is all to do

with who the Lord Chancellor knows and likes. This could mean that

someone could become a judge who is not as worthy or will be as good

at the job as another person who the Lord Chancellor doesn’t know.

Another problem with the Lord Chancellor selecting who becomes a judge

could be due to him having a political bias. The Lord Chancellor is

appointed by the Prime Minister, so is likely to favour people who are

supporters of the Prime Ministers party, so in the case of today this

would be people supporting the Labour Party.

The process of appointing superior judges is extremely secretive so it

is very easy for him to appoint the people he prefers without it

becoming public knowledge that he knew them previously.

When appointing inferior judges the vacancies are advertised. Although

out of the people that apply it is up to the Lord Chancellor to have

the final say.

Another issue to do with the appointment of judges is how sexist and

racist it appears to be as there is a higher percentage of men than

women as judges, and a much higher percentage of white people than

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