Evidence And Procedure In Scotland: A Comparison With England
| Author | J. Martin Mackay |
| Published date | 01 April 1951 |
| Date | 01 April 1951 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1951.tb00197.x |
EVIDENCE AND PROCEDURE
IN
SCOTLAND
:
A
*COMPARISON
WITH ENGLAND
ALL
ordinary civil litigation in Scotland takes place either
the Court of Session in Edinburgh
or
in one of the Sheriff Courts
scattered throughout the country. The civil jurisdiction of Justice
of the Peace Courts does not exceed
f5
and is not very much
resorted to. The Court of Session has jurisdiction over the whole
of
Scotland and its inhabitants, but the jurisdiction of each
Sheriff Court is limited for. the most part to the confines of the
sheriffdom in which it is situated.
The Court
of
Session is composed of not less than thirteen
or
more than fifteen judges (at the moment there are fourteen). The
Inner House of the Court of Session is in the main an appellate
court, at any rate,
so
far as ordinary actions are concerned. It
sits in two divisions of four judges each, known respectively as
the First Division and the Second Division of the
Court
of
Session. The two divisions have co-ordinate jurisdiction and
possess equal authority. There is in most cases an appeal from
the Inner House
of
the Court of Session to the House of Lords.
The remaining judges are referred to as Outer House judges
or
Lords Ordinary. They sit separately. They are judges of
first
instance and have co-ordinate jurisdiction. The Court of Session
has only one central office. There is in Scotland no equivalent to
the English District Registries nor are there in Scotland anything
resembling English Masters
or
District Registrars,
The Sheriff-Substitute is the local judge of first instance.
In
the
less populous districts,
a
Sheriff-Substitute presides in
more
than one court, but in the larger centres of population, more than
one Sheriff-Substitute is allotted to each court. The civil juris-
diction
of
a
sherift is not limited as regards the value
of
the
subject-matter
in
dispute,
as
the jurisdiction of the county court
judge in England is limited, but in practice, actions involving
large sums of money tend to be raised in the Court of Session.
The Sheriff-Principal is
not,
except in Edinburgh and Glasgow,
a
resident judge, but
a
member of the
Bar
in Edinburgh who visits
the sheriffdom to carry out various administrative duties and
hear
appeals from judgments of the Sheriff-Substitute. In all
such cases an appeal also lies direct from the judgment of the
Sheriff-Substitute to the Court
of
Session. In popular parlance
no distinction is maintained, both officials being referred to as
‘the sheriff
’.
Moreover, when the word ‘sheriff’ appears
in
a
162
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