Ex-law chief hits back at top judge’s Supreme Court attack

Supreme Court too remote and distant, says top Scots judge Yesterday’s Daily Mail

ONE of Scotland’s leading former judges has defended the UK Supreme Court after another senior judge branded it ‘remote’ and out of touch with Scots Law.

The Mail revealed yesterday that Lord Justice Clerk Lord Carloway, Scotland’s second-most senior judge, had attacked Britain’s highest court as ‘far removed’ from the realities of the Scottish justice system.

Now former Solicitor General for Scotland Lord McCluskey has weighed into the row, saying it was ‘unimportant in the context of legal decision-making’ that the Supreme Court was in London.

He also spoke out against Lord Carloway’s apparent suggestion, in a weekend speech, that he had been ‘undermined’ and had faced ‘real hostility’ from colleagues over his plans to axe corroboration, which requires all evidence to be backed up by two sources.

Lord McCluskey said there was ‘nothing personal’ about defending long-established legal rules.

One former judge, who declined to be named, said Lord Carloway was ‘speaking nonsense’ and his remarks were similar to those by senior Nationalists – including Alex Salmond – who have also attacked the Supreme Court.

The judicial clash comes after Lord Carloway was criticised over his public support for some controversial SNP justice policies.

Lord McCluskey, 85, who was Scotland’s longest-serving judge before his retirement in 2004, told the Mail: ‘I am surprised that Lord Carloway should think that the Supreme Court is somehow remote from the Scots scene.

‘It sits in London but that is relatively unimportant in the context of legal decision-making.

‘If the location of the court were vital, the Court of Session itself would be “remote” to people living in the Highlands and Islands, Caithness and Argyll and Bute.

‘What is important is that the Scottish judges who sit in the Supreme Court are invariably two of the very best Scots lawyers of their entire generation.’

In a speech in Edinburgh on Saturday, Lord Carloway said the Supreme Court had a ‘depressing influence’ on those operating in the Scottish justice system.

Officials at the Supreme Court yesterday declined to comment.