Stipendiaries become judges

Provincial and metropolitan stipendiary magistrates - who are mostly solicitors - are to serve on a unified stipendiary magistrates' bench and be renamed 'District judges (Magistrates courts)' under reforms announced last week.

The changes, part of the Access to Justice Act 1999, will allow for a more even workload distribution between the 96 stipendiaries currently working in England and Wales.

The Lord Chancellor, Lord Irvine, said: 'The newly unified bench will enable greater flexibility in the allocation of judicial officers to hear cases, and will improve the efficiency of magistrates' courts.'

The change in name is designed to reflect the professional status of stipendiary magistrates, and will 'provide a judicial title which is easier for the public to recognise', according to Lord Irvine.

The newly unified bench will be led by barrister Penelope Hewitt as the Senior District Judge (Chief magistrate).

Formerly in Leeds, she will now sit at Bow Street magistrates' court.

Meanwhile, plans unveiled last month to create a workload-related funding system for magistrates' courts have been welcomed by senior magistrates.

The plans, put out to consultation, propose that 75% of funding would be based on workload and 25% on accommodation and other overheads.

Funding is currently allocated largely on the basis of population and historical spending.

An additional 2 million would be set aside each year to reward performance, for example in speeding up case processing.The Lord Chancellor's Department meets 80% of Magistrates' Courts Committees' expenditure, with the rest from local authorities.

Lord Chancellor's Department minister Jane Kennedy said the proposals would produce 'a simpler funding system, which allocates grant more fairly'.

A spokesman for the Central Council of Magistrates' Court Committees said that while they 'welcomed' the plans, they 'needed time to examine them further'.

Law Society President Michael Napier said: 'Any review of funding must make special allowances for magistrates' courts in rural areas.

Their existence must not be threatened because they do not have the volume of work which the larger courts have.'

More than 80 magistrates' courts have closed in the last four years, taking down the number to nearly 400.

Victoria MacCallum