Judicial Reform

[Southern Bellz]

I would be interested in complete judicial reform, what are other people's thoughts on that? Especially D2N.

[Antariel]

Sounds fine to me. For.Complete judicial reform along what lines, Bellz?

[Daytime to Night]

It'd give us something to do But there are a lot of aspects of the judiciary that people seem to assume should be in place but arn't or want changing, maybe it would be good to start with a blank page and consider exactly how we think the system should work.

[Hileville]

But there are a lot of aspects of the judiciary that people seem to assume should be in place but arn't or want changing, maybe it would be good to start with a blank page and consider exactly how we think the system should work.

Like what?

[Daytime to Night]

[quote name="Hileville"] [quote name='"Daytime to Night"] But there are a lot of aspects of the judiciary that people seem to assume should be in place but arn't or want changing' date=' maybe it would be good to start with a blank page and consider exactly how we think the system should work. [/quote']

Like what? [/quote]

Things like common law (precedent) and a legal right to representation that people assume they have arn't actually established anywhere.

[Hileville]

I split these posts from Article 7 Amendment. We can post discussion on judicial reform here.

[Unibot]

A judge can come to conclusion on the severity of a punishment by considering how similar cases were ruled previous to him, it doesn't say otherwise and it's only to keep rulings consistent and equitable. At the moment, you can legislate the use of precedent if you'd like, but I don't think its fair to say it isn't a legitimate consideration already.Representation is however a very big problem since it's very clear it was a deliberate omission. Having looked back between old versions of our constitution and our current constitution, along the way there had to be a deliberate legislative move to restrict the South Pacific's citizens' ability to seek representation. Bearing this mind I cannot honestly rule that our current constitution provides a loophole or some exploitable vagueness when both the letter and the spirit of the law begs to differ. I think the lack of legal provisions to be represented is an injustice, since our laws are not simple and we cannot expect the defence as is to be a good 'orator' or a strong 'debater' or experienced at the art of legal interpretation and argumentation whereas those appointed to the judiciary to represent the state generally are all of these qualities.

[Hileville]

We need some more input here.

[Tsrill]

A judge can come to conclusion on the severity of a punishment by considering how similar cases were ruled previous to him, it doesn't say otherwise and it's only to keep rulings consistent and equitable. At the moment, you can legislate the use of precedent if you'd like, but I don't think its fair to say it isn't a legitimate consideration already.

Representation is however a very big problem since it's very clear it was a deliberate omission. Having looked back between old versions of our constitution and our current constitution, along the way there had to be a deliberate legislative move to restrict the South Pacific's citizens' ability to seek representation. Bearing this mind I cannot honestly rule that our current constitution provides a loophole or some exploitable vagueness when both the letter and the spirit of the law begs to differ.

I think the lack of legal provisions to be represented is an injustice, since our laws are not simple and we cannot expect the defence as is to be a good 'orator' or a strong 'debater' or experienced at the art of legal interpretation and argumentation whereas those appointed to the judiciary to represent the state generally are all of these qualities.

I can't really remember that the right to be represented was struck out deliberately.

I know there was something going on at some stage with people wanting to represent other people who were a bit of an issue themselves, but I don't recall that it prompted a legislative amendment.

Precedence is a bit of a problem as we tend to have more law reforms than cases, so that precedents under current law are rare.

[Unibot]

Precedence is a bit of a problem as we tend to have more law reforms than cases, so that precedents under current law are rare.

I've figured this out the hard way, I was planning to index all of our court rulings and it just became a pointless task when I saw how much our law has changed ... realistically its not very useful for developing precedence. Maybe a bit useful for developing sentences like I said.. but realistically not more helpful than a reference.

I'd recommend a simple civil law system but the right to representation seems like something that should be re-incorporated into our system. I'm not sure why, but looking between the older constitution and the new constitution, it's a clear omission.