An interview with the President of the Supreme Court
My companion for the interview told me afterward that the man who journeyed with us on the lift up to Lord Phillips’ office was Justice Lord Mance – such is the intimacy of the new Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. The nation’s final court of appeal is the rather modest and quite frankly lovely Art Nouveau building that you may fail to notice if you happen to be in the Parliament Square area. As you enter the office of the President of the Supreme Court, however, you won’t be able to take your eyes off Big Ben: it will be staring right back at you, framed as it is behind Lord Phillips’ desk.
Lord Phillips, or Nicholas as he prefers, is a friendly, generous man with a manner quite unexpected of one of the world’s senior jurists. Opting to dress in a jumper rather than a jacket for the interview, Lord Phillip’s very appearance reminds one of the informality that surrounds the Court and its proceedings. According to Lord Phillips, when the Lords of Appeal in Ordinary crossed the Square and became Justices, there were a number of aspects of their previous life they wanted to maintain. No robes or wigs for a start. As Law Lords they weren’t technically judges, so men wore suits, a practice continued in the Supreme Court. Another aspect of the Court borrowed from the old House of Lords Committee is the layout. The Justices, barristers, clerks, and audience are all on the same level. The benches are arranged in a semicircle, just as a Lords Committee would be, so everyone in the Court is quite close together. Instead of having judges throned on high and council down below, Courtrooms 1, 2, and 3 try to capture the intimate atmosphere of a debating chamber.
Why did they leave then? Well, it certainly wasn’t without controversy; even some current Justices were opposed to the creation of the Supreme Court. But now, says Lord Phillips, all fully support the Court.
“The announcement was made in June 2003 as part of a package of proposed constitutional reforms which took everybody by surprise because there hadn’t been any consultation. I was one of those who believed it would be a good idea to have a Supreme Court and I’ve remained of that view. Some of the Law Lords were not enthusiastic initially but, since we’ve moved, all my colleagues on the Supreme Court are now persuaded that the move was a good idea.”
And what of Lord Neuberger, the only Law Lord not to follow his colleagues to the Court, and who instead became Master of the Rolls? He believes that the creation of the Supreme Court was not a good idea, and that one should not tamper with an unwritten constitution like Britain’s by introducing something as powerful and unpredictable as a Supreme Court.
Lord Phillips will have none of this: “The object of having a Supreme Court was primarily one of form rather than substance. I don’t think anybody suggested the Law Lords were not acting as an independent court of final appeal for the United Kingdom. The purpose behind the creation of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom was perception: the general public didn’t understand who the Law Lords were. They certainly didn’t know who they were, why they were in the House of Lords, or what they were doing.” When I asked Lord Phillips if he thought the very creation of a court that Parliament had named Supreme had created some unstoppable momentum moving towards legislative oversight, he replies that “the fact that we are called the Supreme Court is not going to result in what Lord Bingham described as ‘a rush of blood to the head’ and start to
overturn Parliamentary legislation”.
This sort of deferral to his immediate predecessor as Senior Law Lord, Lord Bingham, is the sort of disarming modesty that marks one’s time with Lord Phillips. There are two goals he wants to achieve over the next four years until his mandatory retirement. The first is to ensure that the judgements delivered by the court remain of the calibre delivered by the Law Lords. “I’m also very keen that the object of moving here will be achieved, that the public will get to know precisely what the Supreme Court is and the job that it is doing. We have an open door here; I’m keen that people should come and attend our hearings. We already get nine-hundred visitors a week; people are obviously interested in what we are doing. All of this is highly desirable and I hope we get as many visitors as we can manage.” No desire for major constitutional change there; no aim to make his presence felt on Britain’s unwritten constitution.
How does he feel about David Cameron’s pledge to reverse the Human Rights Act and establish a British Bill of Rights? “I have no idea what will change for the Court because until I see the draft Bill of Rights I won’t be in a position to comment on that. But I think it will be difficult for any administration to introduce a Bill of Rights that won’t have as its basis the obligations of this country under the Human Rights Act, an international legal obligation to make sure the European Convention on Human Rights is observed in this jurisdiction.”
While he may be covert in his expression of displeasure towards David Cameron’s judicial policies, he is far more open to expressing himself in other matters. When asked what his advice would be for readers who happen to be law students, this was his reply, full of unexpected candour: “I think law students need tremendous courage. The law is over-subscribed. It has always been quite tough to make it in the law. But all I can say is that if you do, it’s a great life. All I can say is that if you’re keen, you should give it a go. If you’re not keen then my advice would be don’t give it a go, because it’s a very challenging career to set out on.”
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