Shona Wilson Stark, The Work of the British Law Commissions – Law Reform…Now?
| Pages | 327-328 |
| Date | 01 May 2018 |
| Published date | 01 May 2018 |
| DOI | 10.3366/elr.2018.0499 |
| Author |
“The Law Commission a talking shop which makes lawyers think they are effecting change when nothing changes (sic)”. So tweeted former minister Lord Adonis in October of last year, reflecting the views held by some in government – and indeed the general public – that the Law Commission and its Scottish counterpart, the Scottish Law Commission (“SLC”), are merely another quango producing very little in the way of real reform. Shona Wilson Stark's new text provides a strong riposte to this attitude and makes a robust (although not uncritical) defence of the law commissions and their work.
For a work on the mechanics of law reform, it is appropriate that the text in many ways mirrors the structure of a report by one of the commissions. We begin with a history of the formation of each commission and the relevant provisions of their founding legislation, the Law Commissions Act 1965 (“1965 Act”). Stark goes on to assess the manner in which the commissions operate within the confines of the legislation and theorises how it can best go about its stated objective “to take and keep under review all of the law”. Proposals are made as to how the work of the commissions can be improved and, as a commission report would, the book contains draft amendments to the 1965 Act to give effect to these recommendations.
The focus on the history of the commissions in the initial chapter is essential. As Stark puts it, “the longer you can look back, the further you can look forward”. Stark notes the impassioned pursuit of law reform by Lord Chancellor Gerald Gardiner, building on his work in
The commissions' key duty in the 1965 Act – “to take and keep under review all of the law” – is staggeringly broad and Stark highlights the fact that the commissions require clear selection criteria to identify projects which are...
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