I’m way behind Charon and John Bolch with this story, but must throw in my tuppenceworth. It seems that Lord Hope and his pals on the well-upholstered putative Supreme Court bench are unhappy about the address of the new court, in Little George Street, SW1, and with the domain name the court will have on the web.
I have no sympathy at all with their no-longer-to-be-Lordships on the physical address point. An address is an address, and that’s that; their dislike for Little George Street is silly, infantile special pleading. They should worry less about the size of their George Street, and more about what they do in it.
I have a little more sympathy with them as far as the domain name is concerned because they are not part of government – indeed, respecting the separation of powers was the reason (although a completely misguided one in my view) for bringing the Supreme Court into existence, so it seems strange to give it a domain that apparently links it to government.
However. Lord Hope say he’d have liked supremecourt.uk, but the problem with that is that the rules prevent people from registering pure “.uk” or “top level” domains of that kind nowadays. So, as with the street address, Lord Hope is I’m afraid expressing a desire to be exempt from, or above, the rules applicable to everyone else. No more impressive an attitude from a constitutional court than it is from Parliament.
And anyway, if they don’t like being associated with the executive, why don’t they use uksupremecourt.org.uk? The Ministry of Justice has bagged it for them. Or uksupremecourt.org, which is still available?
But bizarrely the MOD and the NHS have their own SLDs, ie mod.uk and nhs.uk, and they are part of the government. Parliament.uk also exists.
Wikipedia gives some history, but no information on why new SLDs are forbidden.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.uk#History
I absolutely agree with you Head of Legal. This really is trivia coming from obviously well heeled people at a time when the country’s economy is in meltdown.
As for the so-called Supreme Court of the UK it will, in reality, be no such thing since, as an example, there will not be criminal appeals from Scotland.
In our common law system, the link between the judges and Parliament was important in that it enabled the judiciary to have a proper voice at the heart of law making albeit in the House of Lords. This link will be lost within a few years and Parliament and the nation will be the poorer for it.
I absolutely agree that applying the “separation of powers” argument in this way was a “misguided view” which emanted from a European Report. The Appellate Committee was NOT influenced by non-judicial House of Lords members and it served our country well. In my view it will be missed only to be replaced by something with virtually the same powers but with less influence in the seat of law-making: Parliament itself.
I would have thought it sensible to allow supremecourt.uk to be registered. The gsi.gov.uk sub domain is the one used by, for example, all CPS prosecutors. It seems to me odd, and wrong, for the Supreme Court to be put in the same category as them.
The other alternative is to create a new SLD specific to the judiciary. So, law.uk, or judiciary.uk, and so on. Ultimately, the Nominet Rules are there to facilitate, not obstruct.
I would object to the use of uksupremecourt.org or whatever. It sounds as though a 14-year old from Epping has set up a blawg or something. It is not immediately identifiable as being our Supreme Court, and could only be that (i.e. see the USA’s version, where the .gov domain precludes any other possibility.)
I agree with Martin George. The law.uk idea is a must and will give clarity to the legal aspect of UK internet. .xxx should follow.
Just a point of order, really, but is it actually the Supreme Court?
Can it not be overruled then?
@Unsworth – The new SC will have similar powers to the House of Lords. There will be no national court able to overrule it. The SC will be able to “depart from” its own previous decisions. The SC will be bound to take into account decisions of the European Court of Human Rights (Human Rights Act 1998 s2) and will be bound to apply decisions of the European Court of Justice. Parliament will be able to change the law (including reversing any SC decision) just at it can do today.
@ Peter Hargreaves.
Thanks, but my somewhat wry comment arises from my real concern about the ECJ’s powers…
And, in my view, if the SC has ‘similar’ powers to The Lords – why change? Is this the beginnings of political control?
@Unsworth – I don’t think it is political control. There was a report from somewhere in the EU which pointed out that having a court within Parliament did not, in their view, comply with the notion of separation of powers. The government here responded with the Constitutional Reform Act 2005 which sets up the new Supreme Court of the UK.
Head of Legal has expressed the view that this was misguided. For what it is worth I agree with him. There was no evidence whatsoever that any decisions of the HL (Appellate Committee) were or are influenced by anything which goes on in the Lords sitting as a legislative chamber.
Note also that new Judges of the Supreme Court will not necessarily receive life peerages and so will not be members of the Lords. Thus, the arrangement breaks the historic link between the judges and Parliament.
You have referred to the ECJ’s powers. The fact is that European Community law is supreme and overrides any national law. The supremacy was actually well-established when the UK joined in 1973. However, it was the Factortame litigation which finally drove the point home to the British judiciary. [Fighting this cost the British taxpayer millions]. As Europe has developed and increased its role, it follows that Community law governs more and more areas of our lives.
I am sure that Head of Legal will put me right if I have got anything wrong here since I don’t claim to be an expert on EU law.
Martin, David – I like the idea of law.uk, or maybe court.uk. That would sort it out.
Peter, I agree with you!
Of course it remains true that parliament is ultimately sovereign, since the recognition in our legal system of the supremacy of EU law depends entirely on section 2 of the European Communities Act 1972. Parliament can always repeal that, which in effect would be a UK decision to leave the EU.
People sometimes think supremacy of EU law and Parliamentary sovereignty are contradictory – they’re not.