Litigation in the 1990s
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2230.1991.tb02647.x |
| Author | Lord Mackay |
| Date | 01 March 1991 |
| Published date | 01 March 1991 |
THE
MODERN
LAW
REVIEW
Volume
54
March
1991
No.
2
Litigation in the
1990s
Lord Mackay of Clashfern*
Ladies and Gentlemen, it gives
me
great pleasure
to
be here this evening
to
deliver
this, the Modern Law Review/Shimizu Foundation Lecture. Last year,
I
was
privileged to chair the first lecture in this series given by Professor Basil Markesinis.
Hc took as his topic ‘Litigation Mania in England, Germany and the USA: Are
we
so
very different?’.’ For my topic this evening
I
have chosen to speak on
‘Litigation
in
the
199Os,’
in the context of this country alone. Some of you here
may have heard me talk on this before, in the context of
the
Civil Justice Review
and the Courts and Legal Services Act.
I
do not apologise for making further reference
to this tonight, but
I
hope
I
will
also be able
to
encourage
the
development
of
further
and wider thoughts on this topic.
I
particularly welcome the opportunity
to
talk
to
an audience comprising a significant number of academics and
I
hope you will
participate actively in such a debate. This country has often been
in
the forefront
of developments in the law over the centuries and
if
we want to maintain that position,
we
must not fall into the trap of complacency.
Thoreau once said, ‘Our life is frittered away by detail
.
. .
simplify, simplify.’
Certainly, during the course of the
1980s,
my distinguished predecessor, Lord
Hailsham, responded
to
a growing awareness that the civil justice system in this
country was becoming too complicated and too costly by setting up the Civil Justice
Review whose terms of reference were:
To
improve
the
machinery of civil justice in England and Walcs by means
of
reform in
jurisdiction, procedure and court administration and in particular
to
reduce delay,
costs
and
complexity.
Much of that work will come to fruition
in
the early years of this decade.
The Civil Justice Review concluded that the High Court should retain its separate
identity as a specialist forum, but found that
too
many cases of relatively low
importance, substance and complexity were being handled and tried at an inappro-
priately high level. This was wasteful of High Court resources, inflated the cost
of smaller cases and clogged up the courts, exacerbating delay.
Its
main recommenda-
tion was that there should be a new system of civil jurisdiction and case allocation.
The High Court should be reserved for public law cases
-
including judicial review
-
and other specialist cases and general cases of unusual substance, importance
or complexity. Other general cases of unremarkable importance, substance or
*Lord Chanccllor.
This is thc text
of
thc Shiniizu Icciure delivered
at
the
London
School
of
Economics
on
6 Dcccnibcr 1990.
1
An
cxpundcd vcrsion
of
this lecture
was
publishcd
in
(1990)
53
MLR
I.
ilrc
Morlern
Law
Review
542 March 1991 0026-7961
171
To continue reading
Request your trial