These judges used to be barristers, and so it is not surprising that they call for a large pay packet. The minimum amount to pay for a stipendiary judge per year is around £80,000, which is a huge amount compared to the amount of money the state pays out towards lay magistrates. If professional judges were to be used, then the cost of magistrates would increase a lot.
Another factor in weighing up the advantages and disadvantages of replacing lay magistrates with professional magistrates is the idea of time. When magistrates are present in court, it takes a long time for anything to get done. This is mainly down to the lack of experience a lay magistrate has in court, and their lack of knowledge in law. It takes twice as long for the magistrates to make a decision as well, as the court clerk has to advise the magistrates upon what the appropriate jurisdiction is. This wasting of time can cost the court a lot of money, and often causes other cases to be delayed.
Because stipendiary judges have a lot of knowledge in law, and much experience in court, time is saved when these judges are sitting. This could conclude in the saving of money, but as professional magistrates cost more, this argument is debatable. According to Elliot and Quinn, one stipendiary judge can perform the work of around thirty lay magistrates, which means that using these paid judges could save a lot of money.
A really important fact to consider is the amount of expertise of each profession. Firstly, the lay magistrate has little expertise. The amount of knowledge a lay magistrate has is restricted to their training, in which they are taught the basics of the law that the lay magistrates need to act on. Also, because most lay magistrates work only one half day a week, they have little experience in the court, and so their expertise is restricted here also.
In comparison, a professional magistrate, being a trained barrister, would have a lot of knowledge of the law, as they would have had to gone through many years of education before becoming a barrister. Also, it would be fair to say that because stipendiary magistrates work full time, they would gain a fairly large experience of what it is like to work in a magistrate court as a magistrate. In this way, the expertise of a stipendiary magistrate isn’t as limited as the expertise of a lay magistrate, and so it is better for the court if a judge with more knowledge were to sit. This would also mean that a court clerk would be unnecessary, and so save money.
Another reason would be the local knowledge of lay magistrates compared to stipendiary judges. Lay magistrates, to qualify for service in a court, need to live with fifteen miles of the court. This usually means that they hold a local knowledge of the area. Assuming that a professional judge doesn’t live within this limit, the judge would have less local knowledge of the immediate area, and this could affect the hearing,
Finally, the idea of conviction mindedness would likely affect the judgement of a stipendiary magistrate, as they would work full time. This, compared to the judgement of a part time lay magistrate would differ greatly, decreasing the validity of their findings. Also, lay magistrates are supposed to solidify that the legal system is a judgement of people by the people. If upper class professional magistrates were to overrun the courts, then this would be less correct, and would cause some debate upon the efficiency of the courts.
In conclusion, I think that it is more appropriate for lay magistrates to be used than qualified lawyers, as they save money, and support the idea of justice, as it is a judgement of the people by the people. Also, as the Lord Chancellor has emphasised, “I have no plans for a wholesale replacement of the lay magistracy by stipendiary magistrates… Without the lay magistracy, there would be a justice system – but it would be much less ‘of the people, by the people, and for the people’.”
