DELEGATED LEGISLATION

Waipa Post, Volume 49, Issue 3554, 6 December 1934, Page 3

DELEGATED LEGISLATION

Not since Lord Hewart’s attack on bureaucratic usurpation in his book, ‘ The New Depotism,’ has the topic been more vigorously dealt with in public than it was in a paper read at a meeting of the Law Society by Mr M'cKeagh, M.P. says the London Daily Telegraph. I Lave hlad exceptional opportunities in my dual role as a practising solicitor and as an M'.P. said Mir M'cKeagh, “of observing the growing tendency of Government Departments to filch legislative power whenever opportunity presents itself.

‘ I do not think there can be any doubt but that there is a conspiracy on the part of highly-placed Government officials in Whitehall to usurp the legislative functions of Parliament and to oust the jurisdiction of the courts.

“ It is none the less a grave position because the conspiracy is in all probability tacit rather than plotted, and the danger is none the less real because the motive actuating those officials arc of the most high-minded and public-spirited character. “ There is, indeed, I think, a deepseated but perfectly honest official conviction that the best and most scientific method of ruling the countiy is by departmental edict, without interference or circumscription by Parliament and unassaibale in the courts.

“ This, 'abrogation of the Rule of Law and the Sovereignty of Parliament are being rapidly brought about by piecemeal and subterranean methods.

“ The whole system of government is being' undermined in a way which the public would not tolerate if it were cognisant of it. At the moment, however, it is clearly escaping general notice, and, unless checked, will continue to escape notice until the mischief has been carried to completion. “ We in this country are fast creating a retrograde system, whereby the .administration —the Government Department —is being placed above the! law in a way which constitutes a real treat to our cherished rights .and liberties.

“It is an essential ingredient of good law thia,t it should be certain, but what certitude is there about the great bulk of the law to-day? There can be no question that the task of finding the law is being rendered inordinately difficult by this system of legislation by regulation. “ Then again, there is the uncei*tainty created by giving the Minister power’ to decide that different parts of of an Act shall come into operation on different dates. This leads to considerable confusion. Indeed, places have been known where the police have actually instituted prosecutions in the belief that certain sections of an Act have come into operation, only to discover later that they were mistaken.

“ it is the first and most fundamental principle of natural justice thla.t a man may not be a judge in his own cause, but the judicial and cjuasijudicial powers conferred upon departments now enable the bureaucrat to fill tfie threefold role of legislator, administrator, and judge. Too often he is not only both suitor -and judge, but a judge who is unappealable. “ Could anything be more ludicrous? Grave hardships are being inflicted by this evil system, and justice is too often being burked by the ipse dixit of some departmental official. “ To such an extent fare the Government Departments exhibiting an increasing tendency to arbitrary and unconscionable action that it should not be surprising if, ere long, there is a powerful reaction against the exaggerated extension of Government functions.”