Day 157 - 18 Jul 95 - Page 41
1 remember that Parliament has decided that Legal Aid is not
2 available for defamation proceedings, whether for
3 Plaintiffs or for Defendants, to realise that it must be
4 so, that there is no residual power to make an order for
5 payment out of public funds for something as relatively
6 insignificant as a daily transcript.
7
8 I say "relatively insignificant" because, by comparison
9 with the provision of a full legal team appropriate to the
10 circumstances of the case, which is what would be available
11 under Legal Aid, the daily transcript is a relatively minor
12 tool in the daily conduct of the case.
13
14 If Parliament thinks it (and continues to think it, as it
15 does) inappropriate to provide for litigants in defamation
16 proceedings to have legal representation at public expense,
17 why, then it is inconceivable that the judge in court could
18 have any power to cure what he might see as a minor
19 disadvantage in the absence of daily transcripts.
20
21 My Lord, it is not certain, in our submission, that your
22 Lordship's present circumstances in this case allow you to
23 have regard to Article 6 of the European Convention on
24 Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms. My Lord, there
25 appear to be two circumstances in which there is
26 permissible, according to the Court of Appeal in the
27 Derbyshire County Council case. The first is that English
28 law is unclear on the question before the court, or else
29 that it may appear to the court that English law is in
30 conflict with any part of the convention.
31
32 My Lord, that said we have no interest in, as it were,
33 skirting around any potential problems which might lie in
34 relation to Article 6. For that reason, I will, if I may,
35 as briefly as possible, refer your Lordship to some
36 provisions of the Convention and to some of the decisions
37 which have been made under it.
38
39 I have copied the relevant parts of the Convention. One
40 sees from the back of it that the United Kingdom which,
41 I think, ratified the treaty in March 1951, as your
42 Lordship well knows, it is not yet -- whether it ever will
43 be, I do not know -- part of the law of England which is
44 why the courts are not obliged to have regard to it, except
45 in the circumstances which I have alluded to.
46
47 My Lord, a convenient starting point is Article 25 which is
48 on page 12, again French on the right-hand side, English on
49 the left, towards the bottom of the page.
50
51 MR. MORRIS: There are some pages missing.
52
53 MR. RAMPTON: Yes, there are; you should have Article 25 there,
54 however.
55
56 MR. JUSTICE BELL: No, I do not. In fact, I go from nine to 14.
57
58 MR. RAMPTON: Has your Lordship got Article 27 there, at the top
59 of page 14?
60
