Privy Council Wake

A Closed Shop in a Small Village

On October 14, 2003 the New Zealand Parliament voted by a very narrow majority to abolish appeals to the Privy Council.  A significant constitutional change was effected by the smallest of parliamentary majorities.  Then Attorney General, Margaret Wilson's motivation was not justice, nor the law.  It was purely political.

The Campaign for the Privy Council was established in 2003 to oppose the abolition of appeals from New Zealand to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council.  The then Attorney-General Margaret Wilson proposed the abolition of appeals, primarily for political rather than legal or constitutional reasons.  The majority of the legal fraternity, business leaders, and the general public opposed the abolition of appeals. A large majority supported proposals for a referendum.

Although the Campaign was ultimately unsuccessful, it did give Margaret Wilson reason to pause. She later admitted that the degree of opposition to her plans almost led her to abandon the proposal.  Nevertheless the third reading of the Supreme Court Bill occurred on Tuesday 14 October 2003. Parliament passed by a narrow majority the bill to end future appeals from New Zealand to the Privy Council, and to establish a new Supreme Court.

The new law allowed convictions and court verdicts entered before 2003 to be appealed to the UK Privy Council--a genuinely august court, consisting of some of the finest legal minds in the world.
  We are now about out of any further appeals.  Significantly three high profile, contentious NZ court verdicts since the abolition of appeals to the Privy Council have made their way to that appeal court and have been overturned. 

High profile appeals involving David Bain in 2007, Mark Lundy in 2013 and Teina Pora in 2015 have seen unsafe convictions by New Zealand courts overturned by the Privy Council. These appeals show the continued need for an independent outside judicial authority.

This tells us how unsafe, how shaky, how immature, and how provincial our NZ legal and justice system has been.  An oft-heard criticism is that our legal and justice system is too small, too incestuous.  Group-think is far too prevalent, meaning that appeal courts far too often become subject to the current "received wisdom" about a case.  Also there are questions about tribal loyalties in the judicial system.  Justices and lawyers know each other, wear the same old-boy,old-girl ties, and are reluctant to criticize one another's work and decisions, lest tomorrow, on another case, the positions will be reversed and the one criticised will be standing in judgement over one's own professionalism and judicial acuity.  Far too much "go along to get along" allegedly exists.

Stephen Franks, lawyer-cum politician-cum lawyer redivivus, has this to say:

Pora type appeals to High Court of Australia

March 4th, 2015


Another embarrassment for our criminal justice system dealt with by  the Privy Council, the world’s best independent  top court.

There will be too much political resistance to admitting a stupid mistake in dumping that inexpensive heritage assurance of judicial objectivity. But the need remains.

We should promptly ask the High Court of Australia to accept our appeals where we need demonstrable assurance that the result will not be influenced by insider defensiveness or local groupthink.

Quite.

In the meantime, let's reflect on the wonderful legacy the Left's Helen Clark and Margaret Wilson have left us.  Thank goodness Helen Clark at least got what she deserved--her "elevation" to the UN consigning her to a universe of corrupt systemic irrelevance.  She has gotten what she wished for.  And it ain't pretty.  Somewhere in the region of the eighth circle of Hell--where the fraudulent and the treacherous receive their rewards.