2015-05-26
644
План.
1. The history of local administration in Britain. The modern system of local administration.
2. Local elections. Local finances.
Cultural and institutional terms.
1.The history of local administration in Britain. The modern system of local administration. The system of local government in Britain has a long and varied history. The county system of local administration dates back to Anglo-Saxon times (about 1,000 years ago), but the first modern systematic framework of local councils was not established until the late 19th c., it was a three-tier system: county – borough or district – parish councils. In the 1960s and 1970s a major reform of the system was undertaken: generally speaking, a two-tier system was introduced in England, Wales and parts of Scotland and a single-tier system in Northern Ireland. The 1990s saw a new reform which has produced a number of single-tier (unitary) councils (authorities) in England, Scotland and Wales. Local government is above all a system of providing public services, such as town planning, housing, education, police, transport, environmental health, fire, consumer protection, social services, libraries, theatres and cinemas and many others. These services, are of three kinds: (1) Environmental services,includeing the supervision of water supplies, street cleaning, measures for ensuring food hygiene, street lighting, the provision of public baths, parks and recreation grounds, etc.; (2) Protective services including fire, police services and civil defence; (3) Personal services, such as maternity and child welfare, education and housing, the provision and upkeep of libraries, museums and even art galleries. All these services are of two kinds: (a) compulsory / mandatory, i.e. required by law, for example, providing schools and teachers; (b) permissive, i.e. those that can be provided at the authorities’ own discretion, like a museum or gallery. Britain’s central government, especially through Parliament, has considerable control over the country’s local government: it may specify the services that must be available at the local level, it may also change the powers and structures of local government, it can in fact even abolish a particular authority, as it did with the Greater London Council (GLC) in 1985.
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2.Local elections. Local finances. Local councillors are usually elected for four years. In Scotland local elections now are held every three years. Every British citizen who is not subject to a disqualification and is on the electoral register has the right to vote at a local government election if he or she is aged 18 and over. A candidatefor election as councillor normally represents one of the national parties although some stand as independent. The number of members elected to a council normally depends on the population of its area: most county councils have between 40 and 100 councillors, and district councils between 30 and 50. The procedure for local government voting is similar to that for parliamentary elections (i.e. the first-past-the-post system), except in Northern Ireland where local elections are held on the basis of proportional representation. Local governments employ some two million people in administrative, professional and technical capacities. In addition to professional administrators, local councils also employ teachers (half the number of those employed by them), health staff, social workers, firemen, manual workers and the police. A large part of local government revenue now comes mainly from the central government grants, allotted after the government has assessed the cost of providing standard services in a particular area, the rest is raised locally, by local taxation and by collection of rents, fees and payments on property provided by the council. In the 1980s, the Conservative government decided to replace the old ‘rates’ system based on property with a ‘community charge’, popularly called a ‘poll tax’, which was the same, regardless of the property or income earned. At the time of its introduction, it was extremely unpopular due to a widespread sense of unfairness. Because of its great unpopularity, in 1993 it was replaced with a new tax — called the ‘council tax’ the amount of which depends both on the number of people living in the house and the value of the property itself.
Cultural and institutional terms. County, borough / district, parish councils; two-tier / single tier (unitary) councils; environmental, protective, personal services; compulsory / mandatory, permissive services; councillor; rates; community charge (poll tax); council tax.
Questions:
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1. Why is the system of local government in Britain so complicated?
2. What two conflicting points of view on the nature of local government determine the political debates in this area of national life?
3. What types of services is local government supposed to provide?
4. What are the ways of financing local government?
References:
Левашова В. А. Современная Британия. М.: Высшая школа, 2007.
McDowall D. Britain in Close-Up. Longman Ltd., 2005.
Лекция 4. Правоохранительные и судебные органы.
План.
1. The legal system. Criminal and civil law. The court system.
2. The police. Fighting crime. The law and order situation.
Cultural and institutional terms.
1. The legal system. Criminal and civil law. The court system.
The present legal system comprises three separate systems: (1) that for England and Wales, (2) that for Scotland and (3) that for Northern Ireland. They differ from each other in terms of procedure, courts and the legal professions. The development of English law has been slow and haphazard, mostly because of the strong sense of tradition in English society.
There is no civil code and no criminal code in England. It is customary to single out three mainsources ofcontemporary English law: (1) Statute law (largely to do with criminal justice) created by Acts of Parliament which are supreme over all other forms of law except for some European Union law; (2) common law (unwritten law / case law) which is the outcome of the past decisions and practices based on custom and common sense (the doctrine of precedent means that the decisions of higher courts bind the judges of lower courts); (3) European Community law, the latest element in English law resulting from Britain's membership in the EU (since 1973), it derives from the EC / EU treaties, from the Community legislation and from the decisions of the European Court of Justice, EU law takes precedence over domestic law in a growing number of areas. There are two mainbranches of law in the UK — (1) criminal law concerned with acts punishable by the state, and (2) civil law which covers disputes between two or more parties — individuals, companies or other organisations. The distinction between the two branches is not precise: e.g., courts may be classified as criminal courts and civil courts, but magistrates’ courts normally have both a civil and criminal jurisdiction. Still, the court system, generally speaking, comprises two types of courts: criminal courts and civil courts. The criminal court structure in England and Wales comprises two levels. The lower court (or court of first instance) is the magistrates’ court, which deals with summary (the less serious) offences, and conducts preliminary investigation into the more serious offences. Such more serious (‘indictable’) offences are mostly tried by the Crown court. Magistrates’ courts are open to the public and the media, they usually consist of three to seven lay magistrates known as Justices of the Peace (JPs). Special ‘juvenile courts’ comprise experienced magistrates and include at least one member of either sex, proceedings are held in private, the media are not allowed to identify a young person concerned in the proceedings (whether a defendant, victim or witness).
The Crown Court is the higher court dealing with very serious offences like murder, manslaughter, rape and robbery, which account for about 2 per cent of all criminal cases. Thus, the Crown courts have exclusive jurisdiction over all ‘indictable’ offences. Innocence or guilt is determined at a trial presided by a judge, with a jury of twelve citizens. The English law presumes the innocence of an accused person, i.e. the burden of establishing guilt lies with the prosecution. The Central Criminal Court in London (known asthe Old Bailey) is now one of the Crown Court centres. Such centres have barristers’ chambers, which provide defence, prosecution and judicial services for the Crown courts of their areas. The administration of the Crown Courts is organised by the Lord Chancellor’s Department in London, the Lord Chancellor being the chief legal officer in the country.
The purpose of the civil law is to cover business related to the family property, contracts and torts (non-contractual wrongful acts suffered by one person at the hands of another), it also includes constitutional, administrative, industrial, maritime and ecclesiastical law.
The civil court structure comprises two types of court, like the criminal court structure: (1) the county court and (2) the High Court. The main difference between them is that most minor claims can be dealt with in the county court, whereas more expensive (usually above 5,000 pounds) and complicated cases are decided in the High Court. However, some civil matters can also be heard by High Court judges sitting in the Crown court, and by magistrates in the magistrates’ court.
2. The police. Fighting crime. The law and order situation. The legal profession. Crime prevention is an important aspect of government policy. The Crime Prevention Agency (with the Home Office) develops prevention and reduction initiatives. They cooperate with local government authorities, the police and independent organisations (like Crime Concern).
The ‘civilian police’are responsible for the maintenance of law and order. Their duties are varied, ranging from assisting at accidents to safeguarding public order. Their main function is, of course, the control of crime. Unlike many other countries, Britain has no national police force controlled by central government.
The oldest police force in the country is the Metropolitan Police, founded in 1829 by Sir Robert Peel to fight crime in London, and from which the modern forces have grown. Outside London, the police are all local forces. The professional head of each regional force is the Chief Constable, who is responsible for all operational and administrative decisions including the actions of the force. The lowest ranking police officer is called a constable.
The Metropolitan Police (or, the ‘Met’ as it is popularly called) zone of operation covers Greater London, but it also provides certain national police services, including the maintenance of a national record of all criminals and crimes, to which local police forces may refer. The “Scotland Yard” is the Criminal Investigation Department (CID), which gets its popular name from the New Scotland Yard, where its offices are situated. The British police are generally believed to be among the finest in the world.
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The legal profession is one of the best-paid in Britain. England is almost unique in having two different kinds of lawyers, with separate jobs in the legal system: (1) Solicitors who deal with general legal work, though specialisation in one area of the law is now widespread. They practise mainly in private firms, but also in local and central government, in legal centres, etc. They are organised by their professional body, the Law Society. In the past, the solicitor was only able to appear for his client in the lower courts (county and magistrates’ courts). Because he could not appear in the higher courts, it was - and in fact still is - usual for a solicitor to hire a barrister if the case was to be heard in a superior court; (2) Barristers are the senior branch of the legal profession, who have the right to fight a case in the higher courts (Crown courts and the High Courts). They belong to the Bar, which is an ancient legal institution and now controlled by the Bar Council. There are also four legal societies, or Inns of Court in London (Gray’s Inn, Lincoln’s Inn, Middle Temple and the Inner Temple). They are law colleges dating from the middle ages. Barristers (=professional advocates) have two main functions: first, to give specialised advice on legal matters and, secondly, to act as advocates in the higher courts. A lot of work in English solicitors’ firms is done by managing clerks, now called ‘legal executives’, who are a third type of lawyers. They now have their own professional body, ‘The Institute of Legal Executives’.
Barristers are self-employed individuals practising the law from ‘chambers’, together with other barristers. The barrister may have difficulty in earning a reasonable living or in becoming established in the early years of practise, but if he or she persists and builds up a successful practice, in due course he or she may become a Queen’s Counsel (QC), known within the profession as ‘taking silk’.
The judges constitute the judiciary, or the third arm of the constitutional system. Compared with other countries, Britain has a relatively small number of judges. As there is no judicial profession in England, all judges are usually appointed from the ranks of senior barristers.
Cultural and institutional terms. Statute law, common law; a magistrate’s court, a magistrate, a Justice of the Peace (JP), a Crown Court, a county court, a High Court, the Old Bailey; the Metropolitan Police, a constable, a Chief Constable, a solicitor, a legal executive, a barrister, a Queen’s Council, taking silk.
Questions:
1. What is the difference between statute law and common law?
2. What is the difference between solicitors and barristers?
3. In what ways is the organisation of British police different from that in continental Europe?
4. What enables the British court system to operate with such a small number of judges?
5. What are the main problems that Britain faces in the area of law and order?
References:
Левашова В. А. Современная Британия. М.: Высшая школа, 2007.
McDowall D. Britain in Close-Up. Longman Ltd., 2005.
