Statutory interpretation Flashcards
What is meant by the literal rule? & case
When a judge follows the precise words of an act, even if they lead to a manifest absurdity
Whitely v Chappell - HELD; D was found not guilty, as, taking it literally, a dead person cannot vote
3 Advantages of the literal rule
- Respects parliamentary sovereignty
- Prevents unelected judges from making law
- Makes the law more certain
What is meant by the Golden rule?
Following the literal rule unless it produces an absurd result
3 disadvantages of the literal rule
- Not all acts are perfectly drafted
- Words have more then one meaning
- Can lead to unfair decisions
What is the ‘narrow’ view of the golden rule? & case
Where a word has more than one possible meaning, the court can chose the most suitable to avoid an absurdity
R v Allen - “to be married and marry another person” is impossible as no one who is legally married can become legally married to someone else — “marry” = go through a marriage ceremony, then an offence could be committed
3 Advantages of the golden rule
- Respects the words of parliament
- Allows judges to chose the most sensible meaning
- Avoids problems of the literal rule
What is meant by the ‘wide’ view of the golden rule?
Where the words have one clear meaning but it would cause an absurd outcome, the courts can modify the meaning of the words to avoid this
Re Sigsworth - murdered his mother, was ‘next of kin’ = only had one meaning but courts modified the meaning of the words to avoid an absurd outcome
What is meant by the mischief rule? & case
Looks at the gap in the law prior to the act and interprets the words to ‘suppress the mischief’
Smith v Huges - the act was seeking to remedy people being bothered as they walked down the streets so D was guilty even though she was not soliciting “in a public place”
3 disadvantages of the golden rule
- Can only be used in limited situations
- Not possible to predict when the courts might use the rule
- Makes the law uncertain
3 advantages of the mischief rule
- Promotes the purpose of the law
- Fills in the gap in the law
- Produces a ‘just’ result
3 disadvantages of the mischief rule
- Makes the law uncertain
- Not as wide as the purposive approach
- Risk of judicial law making
What is meant by the purposive approach? & case
Looking at what parliament intended to achieve
Quintavalle - ‘ embryo means a live human where fertilisation is complete’ 1990 Using the purposive approach, HoL HELD that embroys produced through cell nuclear replacement were covered by the act
3 advantages of the purposive approach
- Leads to justice in individual cases
- Allows for developments within society/technology
- Avoids absurd decisions
3 disadvatnages of the purposive approach
- Difficult to find parliaments intention
- Allows judges to make law
- Leads to uncertainty in the law
2 examples of instrinsic aids to interpretation
- The short or long title of the act (makes meaning clearer)
- Interpretation section (theft act - ‘property’ includes ‘money and all other property, real or personal’
