The Lord Chancellor, formally titled Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain, is the minister of justice for the whole United Kingdom and the highest-ranking Great Officer of State in Scotland and England, nominally outranking the prime minister. The lord chancellor is appointed and dismissed by the sovereign on the advice of the prime minister. Prior to the union of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain, there were separate lord chancellors for the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland. Likewise, the Lordship of Ireland and its successor states maintained the office of lord chancellor of Ireland until the establishment of the Irish Free State in 1922, whereupon the office was abolished.
The Lord President of the Court of Session and Lord Justice General is the most senior judge in Scotland, the head of the judiciary, and the presiding judge of the College of Justice, the Court of Session, and the High Court of Justiciary. The Lord President holds the title of Lord Justice General of Scotland and the head of the High Court of Justiciary ex officio, as the two offices were combined in 1836. The Lord President has authority over any court established under Scots law, except for the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom and the Court of the Lord Lyon.
The Lady Chief Justice of England and Wales is the head of the judiciary of England and Wales and the president of the courts of England and Wales.
In the United Kingdom, the Judge Advocate General is a judge responsible for the Court Martial process within the Royal Navy, British Army and Royal Air Force. As such the post has existed since 2006; prior to this date the Judge Advocate General's authority related to the Army and the RAF while the Judge Advocate of the Fleet was the equivalent with regard to the Royal Navy.
Circuit judges are judges in England and Wales who sit in the Crown Court, the County Court and some specialized sub-divisions of the High Court of Justice, such as the Technology and Construction Court. There are currently over 600 circuit judges throughout England and Wales.
The Judicial Appointments Commission (JAC) is an independent commission that selects candidates for judicial office in courts and tribunals in England and Wales and for some tribunals whose jurisdiction extends to Scotland or Northern Ireland.
There are various levels of judiciary in England and Wales—different types of courts have different styles of judges. They also form a strict hierarchy of importance, in line with the order of the courts in which they sit, so that judges of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales are given more weight than district judges sitting in county courts and magistrates' courts. On 1 April 2020 there were 3,174 judges in post in England and Wales. Some judges with United Kingdom-wide jurisdiction also sit in England and Wales, particularly Justices of the United Kingdom Supreme Court and members of the tribunals judiciary.
A justice of the High Court, commonly known as a High Court judge, is a judge of the High Court of Justice of England and Wales, and represents the third-highest level of judge in the courts of England and Wales. High Court judges are referred to as puisne justices and wear red and black robes.
The judiciaries of the United Kingdom are the separate judiciaries of the three legal systems in England and Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland. The judges of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom, the Special Immigration Appeals Commission, Employment Tribunals, Employment Appeal Tribunal and the UK tribunals system do have a United Kingdom-wide jurisdiction but judgments only apply directly to the jurisdiction from which a case originates as the same case points and principles do not inevitably apply in the other jurisdictions. In employment law, employment tribunals and the Employment Appeal Tribunal have jurisdiction in the whole of Great Britain.
Robert John Anderson Carnwath, Lord Carnwath of Notting Hill, CVO, PC is a former British Supreme Court judge.
The President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom is the highest-ranking judge in the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. It is equivalent to the now-defunct position of Senior Lord of Appeal in Ordinary, also known as the Senior Law Lord, who was the highest ranking among the Lords of Appeal in Ordinary. The current President is Robert Reed, since 13 January 2020.
The Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007 is an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It provides for several diverse matters relating to the law, some of them being significant changes to the structure of the courts and fundamental legal procedures. Part 1 provides a scheme for radical overhaul of the tribunal system in the UK, creating a new unified structure with two new tribunals to embrace the former fragmented scheme, along with a Senior President of Tribunals. Part 2 defines new criteria for appointment as a judge, generally reducing the length of experience required with the aim of increasing diversity in the judiciary. Part 3 creates a new system of taking control of goods in order to enforce judgments and abolishes ancient common law writs and remedies such as fieri facias, replevin and distress for rent. It introduces a modern system of 'certified enforcement agents' and 'exempted enforcement agents' which includes civil servants such as court officers and County Court bailiffs, civilian enforcement officers and police officers. Part 4 makes some changes to attachment of earnings and charging orders to make recovery of debts more straightforward. Part 5 makes some changes to insolvency practice in order to provide low-cost protection for people who have previously been excluded owing to their small debts and lack of assets. Part 6 provides protection from seizure for foreign antiquities and artefacts on display in the UK and whose provenance is alleged to be broken by misappropriation. Such artefacts can only be seized on a court order that was compelled by a Community obligation or a treaty obligation.
The Administrative Justice and Tribunals Council (AJTC) was a non-departmental public body in the United Kingdom, responsible for supervising and regulating administrative justice and tribunals. It was created by the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007, and came into being on the 1 November 2007, under the chairmanship of Baron Newton of Braintree. It was abolished as of 19 August 2013 by the Conservative-Liberal Democrat Coalition Government under the Public Bodies Act 2011.
In the United Kingdom, a tribunal is a specialist court with jurisdiction over a certain area of civil law. They are generally designed to be more informal and accessible than 'traditional' courts.
The Judges' Council is a body in England and Wales that, representing the judiciary, advises the Lord Chief Justice on judicial matters. It has its historical roots in the original Council of the Judges of the Supreme Court, created by the Judicature Act 1873 to oversee the new Supreme Court of Judicature. This body initially met regularly, reforming the procedure used by the circuit courts, and the new High Court of Justice but met less regularly as time went on, meeting only twice between 1900 and 1907, with a gap of ten years between meetings in 1940 and 1950 respectively. After relative inactivity, it was eventually wound up through the Supreme Court Act 1981, which contained no provisions for its continued existence, something Denis Dobson attributes to newer bodies which performed the duties the Council had originally been created to do.
Justices of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom are the judges of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom other than the president and the deputy president of the court. The Supreme Court is the highest court of the United Kingdom for all civil cases, and for criminal cases from the jurisdictions of England and Wales and Northern Ireland. Judges are appointed by the British monarch on the advice of the prime minister, who receives recommendations from a selection commission.
The judiciary of Scotland are the judicial office holders who sit in the courts of Scotland and make decisions in both civil and criminal cases. Judges make sure that cases and verdicts are within the parameters set by Scots law, and they must hand down appropriate judgments and sentences. Judicial independence is guaranteed in law, with a legal duty on Scottish Ministers, the Lord Advocate and the Members of the Scottish Parliament to uphold judicial independence, and barring them from influencing the judges through any form of special access.
Sir Ernest Nigel Ryder, became a Lord Justice of Appeal in April 2013 and was appointed Senior President of Tribunals in September 2015. In July 2020, Ryder became the Master of Pembroke College, Oxford.
The Vice-President of the Civil Division is a Court of Appeal Judge who assists the Master of the Rolls in leading the Civil Division of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales. The power to appoint a vice-president was created by the Senior Courts Act 1981, but was not exercised until Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers was appointed Master of the Rolls in 2000. Because Lord Phillips was in the process of completing the inquiry into the bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE) outbreak, he appointed Sir Martin Nourse the first vice-president so he could serve as Acting Master of the Rolls.
The King's Bench Division of the High Court of Justice deals with a wide range of common law cases and has supervisory responsibility over certain lower courts.
