Abstract
It is perhaps only fitting that in the centenary year since the founding of the Magistrates Association one of its former chairs should author this impassioned, historically well informed and lucidly written plea enjoining those in power prepared to listen, to cherish, protect and actively support the Magistracy. The subtitle recalls the words of Lord Bingham who memorably dubbed this ancient judicial institution a ‘democratic jewel beyond price’.
The book which is neatly divided into 12 chapters, with helpful sub-headings, is well organised and enables the interested reader to follow the line of argument which is richly sourced from the author’s personal and professional experiences as a long serving and now retired magistrate who spent his time on the Kent Bench. At times it can read as slightly repetitive; this is particularly so when he critically examines some of the tensions arising from what Hosking sees as judicial overreach in the way cases are allocated for summary case hearings. This following recent legislative trends, notably the 2003 Courts Act, to employ more costly District Judges (DJ) to what he deems the detriment of magistrates’ recruitment and how this move has other far reaching implications.
The opening chapters seek to lay out many of the recent ‘unwelcome organisational changes’ (p. 31) that have effectively transformed the judicial landscape, and especially that of the local administration of justice, with court closures, amalgamation of benches, increases in out-of-court disposals, set against a wider but contested background of diminishing regard for traditional sources of authority. As well as the bruising diminution of the public service ethos, status and influence of summary justice offered by the bench, underpinned as it is by the often misunderstood and undervalued voluntary unpaid role played by magistrates in keeping the court system afloat.
Chapter four aims to provide a loose canvas of criminological explanations for some of the recent causes of increases in certain types of crime and the differing sentencing options that Courts are tasked to impose, shaped by sentencing guidelines, and delineates some of the dilemmas facing magistrates when dealing with persistent offenders. Although one does baulk at some of the balder and unsubstantiated asides in which for instance ‘deluded penal reformers’ are seen as ‘clamouring for more and cheaper non-custodial punishment’ (p. 82).
Chapters five and six delve into the areas of lay justice and offer a useful time line in which the valiant endeavours of the only independent voice of the lay magistracy, the Magistrates’ Association, to help shape the direction of policy and practice is outlined. The chapter on the role of fallible juries might seem to sit a little uneasily in a book on the Magistracy, as both are tokens of a free society, but Hosking rather deftly discuses just how representative juries actually are, and how they seem impervious to some of the criticisms that habitually beset misplaced public perceptions on out-of-touch magistrates. However, whether abolishing either way offences so that magistrates have increased summary sentencing powers would advance the cause of justice is still very much a moot point.
The following two chapters feature what I felt was a weak examination of the selection, training and appointment of magistrates, in which the much debated issues of diversity and representation are offered up for analysis. Whilst Hosking does not recoil from putting forward at times some of his own tendentious opinions, the absence of any reference to the Lammy Review surely cannot be attributable to the timing of publication? What is I believe unarguable is his well-founded assertion that ‘there is still room for better media and public appreciation of the wide base from which JP’s are actually recruited’ (p. 171).
Chapters 9 and 10 proudly states to the reader, the magistracy has spent 650 years of a manifestly doing a ‘good job at a very low cost’ (p. 216). This reasoned judicial cri de coeur, notes rather despondently perhaps that the only people consistently able and willing to ‘beat the drum’ for the magistracy are magistrates themselves (p. 216). The penultimate chapter seeks to consolidate some of the earlier insights into the resilience and adaptability of the magistracy and a useful checklist is presented to the reader for strengthening the summary justice system. Seeking closer liaison with the National Probation Service being one such aspiration (although references to the post-TR landscape are absent), but some telling and important questions are then posed that might serve to reinvigorate the lay magistracy for the 21st century.
John Hosking writes this timely extolment to the magistracy with knowledge and with a fighting passion on many of the challenges that have faced the bench in recent years .While one could perhaps question some of his more ill-considered forays into populist tropes on law and order, his unflinching commitment to promoting the importance of retaining public participation in the justice system and sharing with the reader over 40 years of unbroken service on the bench shines through. I believe the book provides a well-paced, readable and compelling narrative on the recent history of the local administration of summary justice and the fast-changing role, influence and functions of magistrates.