Labour conference: Tory attacks 'putting judges at personal risk'

Political attacks on judges are mendacious, putting their lives in danger, corrosive to the public’s confidence in the justice system and detrimental to the country’s prosperity, attorney general Richard Hermer and justice minister Sarah Sackman have warned.

The Labour party conference, which got underway in Liverpool yesterday, has revealed growing concern about recent attacks on the judiciary, with the government’s most senior lawyers asked about them at two separate fringe events.

In an event hosted by More in Common and UCL Policy Lab on the rule of law and securing a more prosperous Britain, Hermer said the rule of law was under threat and that it was ‘extraordinary that you can have a shadow justice secretary who is openly calling out named judges suggesting they are not doing their best, that they are not delivering honest judgments’. A facet of populism is to ‘seek enemies and [proffer] easy answers’.

Later in the day, at a Society of Labour Lawyers event, Hermer described recent attacks on judges as ‘deliberate, mendacious and intentional by design. They are doing two things. They are having a real-world effect. When Robert Jenrick names a judge at the dispatch box, he is putting those judges at personal risk. The other impact, particularly pernicious, is what it is attempting to do to the fabric of our society’.

Hermer said no institution should be absolved from criticism. ‘But those criticisms by populists are designed to create mistrust. It’s an attack on the fabric of the rule of law.’

Sackman told the event that she recently visited an immigration and asylum tribunal. ‘People are telling us the most salient issue right now is fixing our broken immigration system. One part of that system is the proper functioning of our tribunals… that tribunal cannot recruit enough judges to sit and hear those cases. And a particular driver for that is the nefarious attacks from people who should know better, Robert Jenrick.

‘We talk about public prosperity. One of the reasons why legal services attracts and contributes £42.6bn to UK GDP is because we have judges who are impartial, who are not corrupt, who are respected. That is why the UK is a jurisdiction of choice. It’s why people choose to do business here. When people attack judges, not only is it shameless and shameful, it is corrosive of public confidence in our justice system and detrimental to the very thing people claim to say they care about.’

Law Society president Richard Atkinson said political attacks on the rule of law had forced law firms to close their offices due to threats made online. To counter the political attacks, Bar Council chair Barbara Mills KC said: 'We absolutely do not stay silent. If good people stay silent, the space will be occupied by people who cause fear.'