LETTER : Pious hopes for legal reform

Gary Slapper
Thursday 22 June 1995 23:02 BST
Comments

Your support helps us to tell the story

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

Your support makes all the difference.

From Mr Gary Slapper

Sir: The central flaw in Access to Justice, Lord Woolf's strategy to improve civil justice (" `Failing' civil courts face radical shake-up", 17 June) is that it aims to achieve much with little or no extra resources.

The report makes a very wide range of proposals, some of which are easily achievable (eg that "court buildings should be clearly signposted") while others are rather pious hopes (eg that "the law in relation to housing should be simplified").

The main thrust of the panoply of recommendations, however, is to provide a quick, cheap McTrial for most disputants while businesses can use a more fastidious, sensitive process.

The shake-up is being presented as an exercise to eliminate the Dickensian dilatoriness of civil proceedings and their prohibitive expense: features which have made many people miserable and a few lawyers very wealthy. It should be recognised, however, that changing the system as planned will simply create a different problem. Differential access to the legal machinery will be lessened but the qualities of legal justice available will dramatically vary.

Yours faithfully,

GARY SLAPPER

The Law School

Staffordshire University

Stoke-on-Trent

20 June

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in