25th Report - Judicial Appointments (Report)

Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.

The Government responds to recommendations not covered in its consultation response, endorsing several on diversity and parliamentary engagement while declining to extend the s 64 duty or to increase the statutory retirement age.

• On diversity training and lay panel members, the Government "fully endorses" the Committee's observation and says the JAC ensures all panellists, lay and judicial, receive equality and diversity training.
• On extending the statutory diversity duty to the Lord Chancellor and Lord Chief Justice, the Ministry of Justice "is not minded to extend this duty beyond the JAC", and does not believe a statutory duty "would make any difference in practice".
• On retirement age, the Government "does not propose to increase the statutory retirement age for judicial office holders", saying different ages by level could be interpreted as "unjustifiably discriminatory".
• On progress reporting, updates on data, judicial careers and the introduction of appraisal are to be included in the second Judicial Diversity Taskforce progress report, due in autumn 2012.

Read the government's response ↗ Report an error