RULES OF PROCEDURE

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 50, 27 August 1930, Page 10

RULES OF PROCEDURE

JUDICATURE AMENDMENT

REVISION NECESSARY

A statement explaining the nature of the Judicature Amendment Bill now before Parliament was made to a "Post reporter to-day by Mr. A. Gray, K.C., president of the New Zealand Law Society.

"The Judicature Amendment Bill, which was discussed by the House of Representatives yesterday," said Mr. Gray, "was introduced into Parliament by the Attorney-General (the Hon. Sir T. K. Sidey), at the request of the Council of the New Zealand Law Society and with the approval of their honours the Judges of the Supreme Court. The Bill is designed to. provide a more uniform method of enacting rules of practice and procedure than at present exists. All proceedings in the Supreme Court and Court of Appeal are necessarily conducted according to the prescribed rules of practice and procedure. The existing rules are contained in the schedule to the Judicature Act passed in 1908, and were originally enacted by the Supreme Court Act, 1882. They have, from time to time, been amended in some respects, but a complete revision of the existing Code of Civil. Procedure is long overdue, and there are several necessary amendments which both Bench and Bar consider, to be necessary^ in the interests, certainly of litigants^ as well as of those who carry them out. At present the power of altering the rules of the Supreme Court and making new rules under the Judicature Act is exercised by the Governor-in-Council, with the concurrence of any two or more of the Judges, and a similar power, in respect of proceedings in the Court of Appeal is vested in three or more of tho Judges subject to the approval of the Governor in Council. Besides the rules under the Judicature Act there are other rules prescribed under a number of other Acts such as the Commissions of Inqui— Act, Companies Act, Crimes Act, Crown Suits Act, Industrial and Provident Societies Act, Public Trnst Office Act, Settled Land Act, Aged and Infirm Persons Protection Act, The Patents, Designs, and Trade-marks Act, Justices of the Peace Act, Electoral Act, and the Divorce and Matrimonial Causes Act. In those cases the power to make rules is not exercisable in quite tho same way as is the power, to make rules under the Judicature Act.. '

"It is now proposed, under the Bill, to set up a Rules Committee comprising the Chief Justice and four other Judges, the Attorney-General, and three lawyers, to be nominated by the New Zealand Law Society and approved by the Chief Justice. It will be the duty of this committee to revise the Code and rules of procedure under the various Acts, and bring them up to date, and also, from time to time hereafter, to consider neces-

sary amendments.

"Conditions have changed very much since the Code was first framed, and, indeed,'conditions are still changing, so that the necessity of providing for changing conditions is quite clear. The power, however, to make the rules is not intended to \be absolutely vested in the Rules Committee. It will still be exercised by the Governor-General in Council.. The Bill provides that' the Governor-General in Council, with the concurrence of the Chief Justice, and any four or more of the other members of the Rules Committee, of whom at least one shall be a Judge, may, from time to time, alter or revoke the rules contained in the Code or the rules of the Court of Appeal, and may also make Slick additional rules touching the practice and procedure of those Courts in all matters within their jurisdiction as may be deemed advisable.

"The Rules Committee in England consists of the Lord Chancellor, together with four or more of the following persons: the Lord Chief Justice, the Master of the Rolls, the President of the Probate Division, and four other Judges of .the Supreme Court, two practising barristers, and two practising solicitors.

"The provisions of the Bill now before Parliament have been considered and approved by the councils of all the district law societies of New Zealand and of the New Zealand Law Society and, as has been said, by their Honours the Judges. It is considered that the work of the proposed Rules Committee will be more effective than the more or less haphazard methods of the past "