Statute Law (Repeals) Bill 2012 Notes on the Bill Volume 1
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Statute Law (Repeals) Bill 2012 Notes on the Bill Volume 1 October 2012 PREFACE These Notes on the Statute Law (Repeals) Bill 2012 have been produced by the Statute Law Repeals teams at the Law Commission for England and Wales and the Scottish Law Commission. The notes describe each of the repeal proposals in the Bill. They are based on the research and consultation material produced for each proposal. An electronic version of these notes is available on the website of the Law Commission for England and Wales: http://lawcommission.justice.gov.uk/publications/19th_statute_law_repeals_report.htm. i STATUTE LAW (REPEALS) BILL NOTE ON THE 2012 BILL Introduction and background 1. This Bill has been prepared by the Law Commission and the Scottish Law Commission pursuant to section 3(1) of the Law Commissions Act 1965. A draft of the Bill was appended to their recent joint report on statute law repeals: Statute Law Repeals: Nineteenth Report.1 In April 2012 this report was laid before the Parliament of the United Kingdom by the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice and before the Scottish Parliament by the Scottish Ministers. The text of this report (including the Bill in draft form) is available on-line at http://lawcommission.justice.gov.uk/publications/19th_statute_law_repeals_report.htm . Hard copies of the report will be supplied to members of the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills considering the Bill. Also available (on the same link) are more detailed research notes on individual repeals. 2. Work on statute law repeals has been carried on at intervals since 1856.2 Between 1856 and 1966 some 45 Bills were enacted to repeal obsolete legislation. 3. The scope of early Bills to repeal outdated legislation was confined to the repeal of enactments which were spent, obsolete, unnecessary or superseded or which had ceased to be effective on other technical grounds. In 1969, however, following the establishment of the Law Commissions, the terms of reference of the Joint Committee on Consolidation Bills were extended to cover Statute Law (Repeals) Bills, now defined in the standing orders of both Houses of Parliament as- "Bills prepared by one or both of the Law Commissions to promote the reform of the statute law by the repeal, in accordance with Law Commission recommendations, of certain enactments which (except in so far as their effect is preserved) are no longer of practical utility, whether or not they make other provision in connection with the repeal of those enactments." 4. Statute law repeals work is carried out by the Law Commission and the Scottish Law Commission pursuant to section 3(1) of the Law Commissions Act 1965 which imposes upon both Commissions the duty to keep the law under review “with a view to its systematic 1 Law Com No 333, Cm 8330; Scot Law Com No 227, SG/2012/39. 2 An Act of 1856 repealed a selection of obsolete enactments: 19 & 20 Vict. c.64. ii development and reform, including in particular … the repeal of obsolete and unnecessary enactments, the reduction of the number of separate enactments and generally the simplification and modernisation of the law”. 5. Accordingly the Commissions’ statute law repeals work gives effect to the policy, supported by Government for more than 150 years, of repealing statutes that are no longer of practical utility. The purpose is to modernise and simplify the statute book by removing the clutter of statutory material which is spent or which has otherwise ceased to serve any useful purpose. This saves the time of lawyers and others who use the statute book. It also stops people being misled by obsolete laws that masquerade as live law. The Commissions’ work on statute law repeals forms part of a practical strategy for achieving its objective of improving the statute book. 6. Implementation of the Commissions’ statute law repeal proposals is by special Statute Law (Repeals) Bills. Eighteen such Bills have been enacted since 1965 repealing more than 2000 whole Acts and achieving partial repeal in thousands of others. Each Bill was incorporated in a report from the Commissions explaining the individual repeal proposals. The reports and the Acts by which they were implemented are listed in the Table below. Territorial extent and devolution 7. This Bill extends to England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Any repeal provided for by the Bill may be extended, by Order in Council, to any of the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man or any British overseas territory. 8. In relation to Scotland, the Sewel Convention provides that Westminster will not normally legislate with regard to devolved matters in Scotland without the consent of the Scottish Parliament. Accordingly to the extent that the Bill contains provisions that relate to such matters, the consent of the Scottish Parliament will be sought. 9. In relation to Wales, the Welsh Government has agreed that the consent of the National Assembly for Wales is not required in respect of any matter within the Bill. 10. In relation to Northern Ireland, the consent of the Northern Ireland Assembly is not required in respect of any matter within the Bill.3 3 Statute Law (Repeals) Bills are similar in all material respects to Statute Law Revision Bills which are exempt from the legislative consent motion provisions of the Northern Ireland Assembly Standing Orders: Order 42A(12). This exemption was inserted in the Standing Orders in January 2012 and applies equally to consolidation Bills. iii Financial effects and public sector manpower 11. The Bill will not entail any public expenditure, nor will it have any public sector manpower implications. Compatibility with the European Convention on Human Rights 12. Because the only purpose of Statute Law (Repeals) Bills is to repeal statutory provisions which are no longer of legal or practical effect, the Bill does not give rise to any Convention issues. 13. Section 19 of the Human Rights Act 1998 requires the Minister in charge of a Bill in either House of Parliament to make a statement before Second Reading about the compatibility of the Bill with the Convention rights (as defined in section 1 of that Act). Accordingly a statement has been made by Lord McNally (Minister of State, Ministry of Justice) saying that in his view the provisions of the Statute Law (Repeals) Bill are compatible with the Convention rights. Commencement 14. The Bill will come into force at Royal Assent in accordance with clause 3(2). Summary of the Bill Clause 1 15. Clause 1 repeals the enactments contained in Schedule 1 and introduces the savings in Schedule 2. Clause 2 16. Subsection (1) has the effect of extending the Bill throughout the United Kingdom (i.e. England and Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland). Each repeal and any associated saving extends to the part or parts of the United Kingdom to which the provisions being repealed extend. The Bill does not extend to any territory outside the United Kingdom (subject to subsection (2)). 17. Subsection (2) provides power, by Order in Council, to extend any of the Bill’s effects to the Channel Islands, the Isle of Man and any British overseas territory. Clause 3 18. Clause 3 provides for the short title and commencement. The Bill will come into force at Royal Assent. iv Schedules 1 and 2 19. Schedule 1 contains the repeals and revocations proposed. These are subject to the savings which are contained in Schedule 2. 20. The repeals in Schedule 1 are divided by subject matter into eleven parts. These are: Part 1: Benevolent Institutions. Many of these 72 Acts relate to charitable institutions such as schools, hospitals or almshouses founded in the 18th or 19th centuries to meet the needs of the sick, poor or elderly Part 2: Civil and Criminal Justice. These repeals cover a variety of topics including distress, extradition, forgery, fraud, the police and the sale of public offices Part 3: Indian Railways. These obsolete Acts relate to the various railway companies that operated in the former British India and in the wider East Indies Part 4: Ireland (Dublin City). The 40 Acts here relate to the City of Dublin and were enacted by the United Kingdom Parliament before Ireland was partitioned in 1922 Part 5: Local Courts and Administration of Justice. These repeals mostly relate to statutes passed to authorise the building of local courts throughout England and Wales. Many of the courts were debt courts that became superseded in the 1840s by the county courts system Part 6: London. The 92 Acts here, spanning the period 1536 to 1974, reflect events such as the dissolution of the monasteries, the rebuilding of St Paul’s Cathedral after the Great Fire of 1666 and the use of gas in the 19th century to light the streets of London Part 7: Lotteries. These Acts authorised the holding of private lotteries to raise money for the disposal of valuable works of art and literature as well as the Pigot diamond Part 8: Poor Relief. These obsolete laws relate to the poor law relief arrangements that existed before the modern welfare state. They operated on a town or parish basis Part 9: Railways. Most of these 295 Acts relate to abortive projects throughout Great Britain to build new railways or to extend existing lines. Other Acts contain obsolete freight-charging provisions Part 10: Taxation and Pensions. This Part contains remnants from the Tax Law Rewrite Project, obsolete laws providing for local taxation in Scotland, and spent pensions provisions v Part 11: Turnpikes. These obsolete enactments relate to the building and repair of roads in Gloucestershire, Oxfordshire and Surrey (and certain roads connecting London with Holyhead) at a time when roads were maintained locally, with travellers having to pay a toll to pass through the turnpike gate.