HIGHEST COURT

Press, Volume CIV, Issue 30764, 31 May 1965, Page 13

HIGHEST COURT

Change Not Likely

(Special Crspdt. N.Z.P.A.) LONDON, May 30. There is little conviction in Whitehall that the plan for a Commonwealth Supreme Court, now being put forward by a group of Tory backbenchers, stands much more chance of acceptance than its predecessors, says the “Guardian.” The argument against the plan is that any form of joint court raises the prospect of a member nation having to give up a portion of its sovereignty, and this is something that the prime ministers of countries newly emerged from colonial rule I are understandably reluctant to do. On the other hand, more of the 21 sovereign States of the Commonwealth are tending to follow the examples of India and Canada and abolish the right of appeal to the judicial committee of the Privy Council in London. Thus the committee has become a kind of rump institution in Commonwealth terms, no longer providing an effective legal link, and standing in the way of some more modern institution which might be capable of doing an effective job.