Statutory Interpretation Rules of Interpretation

hello everybody and welcome to the second of the statutory interpretation videos and this one if you recall from the end of the introduction is going to be on the rules of interpretation and it's going to be or through this is a level of complexity involved in the rules of interpretation and so to try and help us to clear that in our minds I divided the page the canvas here into four and each one of these areas that I've divided makes it very clear we'll talk about one of the rules of interpretation okay so that's why the page looks slightly different than it would normally and remember there are some key rules the just to put them in context the rules of interpretation are a guide for judges as to how they should go about interpreting what Parliament meant in statute and there is a list and a set order you'll recall from the last video that judges will always start using the literal they will then progress on through the golden and the mischief rule if the statute has been made by the European Parliament they can only apply the purpose of approach I will go back over that as we go through the video but just bear that in mind they will always start with the literal rule and the literal rule is precisely that it tells the judges that the way in which they should interpret a word or a direction in statute is to give it is literal meaning and by literal we mean it's Ordinary and natural meaning so the literal rule is about giving a word it's Ordinary and natural meaning even if that word leads to an absurdity now let's this goes back sometime Lord Esher a judge in 1892 said if the words of an act are clear you must follow them even though they lead to a manifest absurdity and Lord read in Pinner v everett and that was a much later case 1969 said in determining the meaning of any words or phrase in a statute the first question to ask is always what is the natural and ordinary meaning of that word or phrase in its context in the statute now as you'll see in a moment the reason that this leads to an absurdity is as we saw in the previous video some words can mean many things or placed in the context if you apply exactly what Parliament meant you have to include the things that Parliament didn't foresee a good example of this is white Lee versus Chappell now I appreciate this is an old case 1868 but in white Lee vs. Chappell the statute made it an offence to impersonate any person entitled to voters let's write that down impersonate any person entitled to vote okay so the defendant this statute made it an offence to impersonate any person who was entitled to vote the defendant used the vote of a dead man now a dead man of course is not entitled to vote because he's dead the statute requires or relating to voting rights require a person to be living in order to be entitled to vote the judges apply the literal rule and the defendant is acquitted because he cannot possibly break the law because it was required that the person must be able to vote so we're there we have the application of the literal rule which leads to an absurdity I'll show you some more of those when we look further and when we look at two more cases later so just take a look at some of the general rules of the literal rule now the first thing is it may lead to unexpected results okay as you can see from the old peeling of that orange there the literal rule may lead to unexpected results that were not the intention of parliament it was certainly not the intention of Parliament in white Lee versus Chapel but impersonating any person entitled to vote would mean that people who impersonated dead people would get off would be acquitted what Parliament mented what Parliament met sorry was to stop people voting and using other people's vote to falsely voted they missed that loophole but the application of the literal rule led to an unexpected result it's always we've discussed this the first rule applied okay it should be always be the first rule applied as we've seen below it requires the judge to give the words of the statute their natural and ordinary dictionary meaning and it should be applied without the judge put in any gloss on it so it should be applied without the judge seeking to put a gloss or on the words or to seek to make sense of the statute this is straightforward this is what it says this is how I'm interpreting it and that might mean that the case appears to be contrary to the rules of Parliament not always but frequently the decision that's made could be contrary to the rules of Parliament as we've seen in white Lee Moses Chapel all right so let's all look at a couple of cases in which that is demonstrated in our versus Harris in 1836 the defendant bit off the victims nose in a fight the statute made it offence to stab cut or wound it's what the statute said the court held that under the literal rule the act of biting did not come within the meaning of stab cut or wound as these words implied an instrument had to be used therefore the defendant svit the conviction was quashed not guilty in Fisher versus Bell the defendant had a flick knife displayed in his shop window and that flip knife had a price tag on it statute and the statute in this instance is the restriction of offensive weapons Act 1959 made it a criminal offence to sell or offer for sale sell or offer for sale such flick notes now the court applied the literal rule of statutory interpretation again now I got to go back and dissin and just fill in the blanks a little bit here if you have done contract law you will know very clearly that there is an offer to sell and an invitation to treat an invitation to treat is not an offer and in this case the defendants conviction was quashed because in contract law goods on display in shop windows are not offers in the technical sense but they are an invitation to treat the court found the defendant not guilty even though it was obvious the parliament's intention to stop the sale of these types of weapons was inherent in the statute so in both of those cases the defendant walks free because the literal rule was applied and led to some element of an absurdity now you might say well why on earth do we use the literal rule of course one of the key reasons is that Parliament is meant to be supreme its Parliament's job to change statute to make statute to change the law to amend the law not the judiciary's it's the judiciary's job to interpret the law so the literal rule gives you a good example of where judges are demonstrating very clearly that this is Parliament's intention and it's up to Parliament to make the changes not us because that's what happens in a democratic society Parliament changes the law and makes the law judges just interpret it now not all judges not all members of the judiciary subscribe to this and we'll see that as we work through the different rules so that's the literal rule that's going to take a look at the golden law the golden rule which is applied after the literal rule may be applied where the application of the literal rule would lead to an absurdity so if the court if the judge decides this is going to lead if I decide this it's going to lead to an absurdity if they wish they can then apply the golden rule so the courts may apply a secondary meaning and that secondary meaning may avoid an absurd result and the the case that you want that that comes from is the river where they're always long names on the when I'm trying to write them with a river river where commissioners versus Adamson and that's 1876 to 1877 it's a long world case and what that effectively said is that in that case in the late 19th century is that the court may apply this second meaning if it will observe if it will avoid an absurd result and there are two different types of the Golden Rule there is the narrow approach and the broad approach and they're both well illustrated by some cases in the narrow approach now I should say the narrow approach is applied when the word or phrase is capable of more than one literal meaning okay so if there's more than one literal meaning and the narrow approach is applied and this allows the judge to apply the meaning that avoids the absurdity do you remember in the original video we talked about season and how season can mean spring summer winter autumn or it can mean salt and pepper well the narrow approach allows the judge to choose the one that is obviously applying so the one with the the one that avoids absurdity the broad approach is applied where there is only one literal meaning but applying that one literal meaning would cause an absurdity okay so under the broad approach the court will modify the meaning to avoid the absurdity so in the narrow approach the judge chooses the meaning that avoids the absurdity in the broad approach they narrow the one literal meaning to avoid the absurdity let's have a quick look at these two cases the first is our versus Allan in 1872 and in our versus Allan the defendant was charged with the offense of bigamy under Section 57 of the offences Against the Person Act 1861 now bigamy is when you marry more than one person the statute states whosoever being married shall marry any other person during the lifetime of the former husband or wife is guilty of an offense under the literal interpretation the offense would be impossible and the reason it would be impossible and this is quite complex so so try and get your head around this the reason it would be impossible is because you can't marry somebody if you are already married because it's against the law so if you can't marry somebody because it's already against the law a second marriage is always going to be impossible because you're not allowed to do it because you're already married so under the literal interpretation the offense would be impossible to commit since civil law would not recognize a second marriage and any attempt to marry in such circumstances would not be recognized as a valid marriage and if it wouldn't be recognized as a valid marriage then you can't be married twice so through the Golden Rule the court applied the applied that the word marry should be interpreted as to go through a marriage ceremony therefore it didn't matter whether or not you were married ie you you had a wife or a husband what mattered in this sense is that Mary had its other meaning about going through a marriage ceremony and Allan's conviction was upheld in Adler versus George under the Official Secrets Act in 1920 it was an offense to obstruct a member of the Armed Forces in the vicinity so let's look at these words in the vicinity of a prohibited place the defendant was actually in the prohibited place rather than in the vicinity at the time of the obstruction so if you apply the literal meaning being in the place is not in the vicinity in the vicinity means outside it but close to it in the area the court applied the golden rule again it would be absurd for a person to be liable if they were near to a prohibited place but not if they were actually in it and his conviction is therefore upheld now I put one more here just as a way of demonstrating and that's resyncs was 3:6 worth in 1935 and in case a son murdered his mother she had not made a will and under the statute set in the law on intestacy that is the law when what happens when somebody hasn't made a will he was her sole heir and therefore stood to inherit her entire estate so because she hasn't made a will all of her money goes to him but he's the person that's killed her the court applied the golden rule here holding that an application of the literal rule would lead to a repugnant result and they said that he was entitled to nothing so you can see how the golden rule starts to remove those absurd results the consequences of using the golden rule though because it seems relatively sensible in the face of it is it leads to what we call judicial lawmaking in all three of these cases above you've seen the judge making a decision that changes the law now if you truly believe if you're an absolute purist in terms of democracy and the separation of powers you know that the only person that should be allowed to change the law is Parliament the golden rule starts to allow the judiciary into the process of lawmaking the narrow approach allows judges to choose between several meanings and finally the broad approach the one that we saw in the parameter plays Adler versus George the broad approach allows modification of the meaning of words and you can see this fine gentleman here it's a body modification going on very bizarre so those are the consequences of the golden rule the most important I think for me is that it allows judicial lawmaking okay so it allows you little more making they can choose between several meanings and it allows the broad approach at least allows the modification of the meaning of words let's take a look at the mischief rule the third of our rules and the mischief rule is the oldest this is the one that goes back the farthest and the mischief rule is very clear it's the courts role to suppress this is what the the advocates of the mississipp role would say the courts role is to suppress the mischief the act is aim at and advance the remedy now what on earth does that mean what that essentially means is that whatever an Act of Parliament was trying to put right then the mischief rule would aim to carry out that request so in order to understand decisions in the mischief rule in order to make decisions according to the mischief rule you have to look at what was happening before the act of parliament so let's just take an interpretation of the offenses Against the Person Act in 1861 you would have to look at what was the state of the common law what was the state of the law before 1861 the O APA was introduced in 1861 to stop some mischief to stop some things happening that were obviously wrong in society that Parliament thought that it had to make an act of Parliament the mischief rule looks at that period of time before the act was made now that's important because it's slightly different and will help me to explain the purpose of approach in a moment and you can see the key rules for the mischief rule come from Hayden's case and look at the date of Hayden's case 1584 that's how we know that it's the oldest one and in that then we get some key rules remember the court looks at the gap in the law that Parliament found necessary to close the gap is the mischief it then interprets the act to fill that gap and remedy the mischief Parliament had been aiming to remedy okay and it does that by applying the rules from Hayden's case so the first thing is the judge will look at what was the common law before making the Act the second thing they look at is what was the mischief and the defect for which the common law did not provide ie why did Parliament think it necessary to write statute what was the remedy what was the statue to the Parliament passed to cure the mischief and what was the true reason for that remedy okay to illustrate that will look at Smith versus Hughes and Smith versus Hughes is a 1960s case and in this case the defendants were prostitutes okay hopefully to explain what they were and they've been charged under the street offenses act okay let's run Durst and the street offenses act 1959 and that made it an offense to solicit ie to ask for trade in a public place okay so the offense is soliciting ie selling your wares in a public place now the prostitutes were soliciting from private premises in windows or on balconies so that they could be seen by the public if you apply the literal rule here even the golden rule you will see that the prostitutes were not soliciting in a public place so the judges looked as to what was the mischief that Parliament was trying to prevent and quite obviously in the street offenses act Parliament was trying to stop prostitution that was the mischief prostitution was the mischief and particularly prostitution where by prostitutes stand on the street and sell themselves on the street so what the courts did is it applied the mischief rule holding the act holding that the activities of the defendants were within the mischief of the act even though under a literal interpretation they would be in a private place so in Smith versus Hughes the court uses the mischief rule to be able to make sure that Parliament's will is followed through now one of the consequences of this rule because again it seems eminently sensible we know that it's the oldest of the rules well fellows looking a cigar but unfortunately once again it allows for a far greater degree of judicial more making because it allows the judge to decide what they think Parliament in tell you to put right in the previous law it may not be the case that that's what Parliament intended but it certainly is going to be what the judge thought Parliament intended and therefore laws can be changed on the basis of what a judge thinks now if the golden rule went against the principles of straightforward democracy and the separation of powers the mischief for almost definitely does so you have a balance and the balance is do you a dear to the separation of powers and apply the literal rule but put up with absurd results or do you allow judges to make laws and avoid some of those absurd results but unfortunately at the same time you then don't nor you move to a position where it's not Parliament making your law so it's a very difficult balancing act let's finally look at the purpose of approach and in the purpose of approach this applies to all European law and the aim is to produce the decisions which put into practice the spirit of the law the court looks at the gap in the law the Parliament felt necessary to close then interprets the act to fill that gap and remedy the mischief Parliament had been aiming to remedy okay so that's slightly different slightly different here in terms of what the judge interprets I'm going to come back to that in a moment it's driven by the European communities act 1972 and in that the UK courts it says very clearly the UK courts must give effect to European law so should also use their methods and the methods of the European law is to use the purpose of approach so when we are using be you law and we are trying to interpret EU law because EU judges use the purpose of approach our judges have to use the purpose of approach ok so let's take a look at a case it gives us some idea about what we mean and we'll look at our versus Rogers now interestingly enough that's that's just to relate it that this is an old man this is actually Ronnie beaks who recently died but he's not the person he's not the man concerned but he's just a cantankerous old devil by the looks of it and that's why I've included him in this because in Rogers in 2007 Rogers who is incapacitated by arthritis all right so if he has a quite a severe debilitating illness he was riding his mobility scooter along the pavement on his way home from a perp three women will walk him back to the home or one of their homes after a birthday party in the local Inn a local restaurant an altercation a fight took place a verbal fight as Rogers tried to get past them on the pavement in his scooter he then pursued them in an aggressive manner into a local kebab shop where they had run away in hidden and he called them bloody foreigners and told them to go back to their own country the Lords ruled that Rogers had not only committed the offense under the Public Order Act of 1986 of using abusing threatening a beauty or insulting words or behavior intending the victims to fear immediate unlawful violence or to provoke it but that he had also committed an aggravated race offense under the crime and disorder Act 1998 responding to the court of appeals question as to whether those who are not of British origin constitute a racial group under the crime and disorder Act baroness hale says the answer is yes as it would be to question whether foreigners constitute such a group so the question you have to ask yourself is with the same problem existed if he used the phrase bloody Spaniards rather than bloody foreigners okay so Rogers is relatively straightforward and the purpose of approach is relatively easy to understand I guess what did Parliament intend what does the Act say what did they mean by the act then let's apply that so it looks back so in terms of this this focuses on what Parliament intends what did Parliament intend and it's a modern version of the mischief rule okay it certainly provides judge lawmaking because the judge is allowed to decide what Parliament thought okay and just to demonstrate the difference between the two and let me move up a little bit just to demonstrate the difference between the two what you have is if you imagine this is the act of parliament this is before the act this is after the act the mischief rule looked at this period here all right the mischief rule looked at this period here the purpose of approach looks at the act itself so the mischief rule will say what was going on before the act because that's what will that's what will we'll try to make the ruling on the purpose of approaches what does the act itself say so although they really are doing the same thing the purpose of approach is probably go in more towards what Parliament intended than the mischief Rahl did and finally you can ask the question is how do the courts decide how do the courts decide which one of these rules they follow and the easiest way to say that is that it depends on who the judges as to which rule in which case which which who the judges and which cases as to which rule they're follow and I've got two key judges here when I had to do a draw-off clipping finders photograph but the first is the famous Lord Denning and the second is Lord Simmons Lord Denning said very very clearly we do not sit here to pull the language of Parliament to pieces and make notes and solve it we sit here to find out the intention of Parliament and carry it out and we do this better by filling in the gaps then opening it up for destructive analysis Simmons on the other hand says filling in the gaps is a naked you searching of the judicial function under the guise of interpretation if a gap is disclosed then the remedy lies in an amending act so denon very clearly would follow the mischief or the purpose of approach whereas Simmons would follow the literal or golden approach Simmons believes it's Parliament's job to make law denon seems to think that judges are more or should have a greater role in interpreting the law I'll leave you to decide where you sit on that debate but I'm hoping that that's it it's quite a complex video lecture really there's a lot going on in statutory interpretation but if you go over and over it once you've got it it's very very straightforward and simple to understand okay remember these are rules these are the starting point for judges to be able to make the decisions about how to interpret statute what we'll do in the next video is we'll look at some of the aids that they use to apply to the rule that they've chosen

Channel: The Law Bank

Views: 117,302

Rating: 4.9091673 out of 5

Keywords: law, aqa, ocr, statutory interpretation, a level, literal, golden, mischief, purposive approach

Id: dBFrXK6Q43M

Length: 32min 12sec (1932 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 02 2014