They are appointed by the Lord Chancellor on the information regarding different magistrates in each area by an advisory committee.
There are certain requirements for a lay magistrate, which are that candidates must be aged between 27 and 65. They must also live within 15 miles of the area for which they serve and must not have any previous criminal convictions.
The advantages of lay magistrates are, that they are much more cost effective to administer justice than using juries for example, as they are working for free and they also save the government money. A trial in a magistrate court is much more cheaper and efficient than a trial in a crown court.
If the government is spending less money on lay magistrates, it can spend that money saved on other important issues, such as hospitals, the military and the police service.
Another important advantage is their local knowledge and understanding within an area, which helps to administer their decisions in a fair way.
This takes away any prejudice against magistrates, as they are being honest and faithful to the law system and are part of the area, which can provide a swifter process to proceedings in a magistrate’s court.
Nevertheless, training lay magistrates is a significant advantage. As improved training makes an impact on what lay magistrates should look out for in cases.
Although they do not have extensive legal knowledge; they are trained to understand this knowledge to the best of their ability.
Also, the improved training says that lay magistrates are not complete amateurs to the law.
Furthermore, an advantage for the use of lay magistrates is that there are few successful appeals in a magistrate’s court, which suggests that the system is working.
This in turn will boost public confidence in the law enforcement system, as they will begin to believe that cases can be dealt with quickly and efficiently.
However, as well as having advantages for the use of lay magistrates, there are also disadvantages to this.
A disadvantage for the use of lay magistrates is they are prosecution bias, meaning that they tend to believe the police services over the defence.
This goes to show that as the police are employed to keep order on the streets, an unlawful act against this will not be seen in the same light as an unlawful act between two parties, which does not involve the police.
Moreover, another disadvantage is that lay magistrates tend to be ‘middle-class and middle-minded.’ They are not a true cross-section of people from the local community and may be seen to have little in common with young defendants, which took lead to them enforcing a wrong decision.
In addition, a disadvantage is that the lay magistrates are not legally qualified; therefore they may not fully understand the case in question or could have an influenced decision or doubts about the case, if they do not know what is happening in the court. It is a ‘random’ selection.
The final disadvantage is that there is inadequate compensation for loss of earnings, thus discouraging workers from applying to become magistrates.
As time off is needed, the magistrates do not get money for the time lost at work while working on cases. Working as a lay magistrate can be daunting, which could lead to rushed decisions being made.
In conclusion, I think that the system of lay magistrates is a reasonable one, as the government are trying to increase the number of cases in magistrate’s courts. Which means that the system is working.
It is a cost efficient process, which allows the government to spend less; which eventually leads to the taxpayers paying less.
Therefore, I think that the advantages outweigh the disadvantages, as there is an increasing use of lay magistrates all across the country.
