Justice in Scotland needs to wear a hearing aid and drop the dodgy blindfold

Not that long ago I got one of those brown envelopes in the post from the Scottish Court Service [SCS].

In essence it advised me, in a tone straight out of Ealing Films where all but the heart-warming Cockney ruffians spoke with what used to be known as Received Pronunciation, that I had been called to serve on a jury in November and that I should attend unless I was dead or dying or I suppose about to become the President of the US.  A lengthy list of possible grounds for exemption were printed in what I think was probably 8 point typeface and crammed in a Scrooge-like squeeze onto several A4 sheets of paper.

Being hearing impaired, I contacted the SCS [no easy task] to ask how they would go about ensuring communication support [I use Electronic Notetakers when attending large meetings, conferences or interviews held in large rooms and where the panel sits several miles away from the candidates in order to intimidate them] would be available in the event that I was picked to serve on the jury.

Deaf awareness is obviously not mainstream to the SCS.  It took a little while for the extent of my hearing impairment and its consequences in the context of jury service to sink in.  Once it did, I was quickly advised that I would be excused duty.  I equally quickly expressed a strong desire to do my duty as a citizen and serve on a jury, with communication support following me from the court room into the jury room.  It was as if I had suggested rigging LIBOR or doing something rude to a dead sheep.  There was no way that any communication support worker would be allowed into the jury room with me.  It was the law.

"the law is a ass- a idiot. If that's
the eye of the law, the law is a bachelor;
and the worst I wish the law is, that
his eye may be opened by experience
- by experience."

Accepting that the SCS was but a cog in the machine of government, I resisted the strong temptation to re-enact that scene from Oliver Twist where Mr Bumble declares to Mr Brownlow "the law is a ass - a idiot. If that's the eye of the law, the law is a bachelor; and the worst I wish the law is, that his eye may be opened by experience- by experience."  Instead, I contacted the Justice Secretary, Kenny McAskill, and pointed out the structural discrimination inherent in a law which prevented deaf and hearing impaired people from serving on a jury when they required to use communication support workers.  

I wrote about my exchange with the SCS :  

I was advised that as the law prevents anyone not a juror from being in the jury room that it would not be possible for me to serve on the jury.  This strikes me as being discriminatory and effectively removes deaf and hearing impaired people in Scotland from serving on any jury.

I would urge you and colleagues in government to amend the legislation around this aspect of the criminal justice system to allow communication support workers to enter jury rooms in support of their clients and so enable deaf and hearing impaired people to serve on Scotland’s jury service.

Kenny McAskill, Justice Secretary

As ever, Ministers devolve correspondence with mere citizens to their civil servants.  I got a response which said :

It is important that a person charged with a serious crime has their case decided by a jury of fellow citizens rather than a judge. In Scottish criminal trials, 15 jurors are empanelled.  As you say, legislation prevents an additional person from joining the 15 balloted jurors in the jury room. This is in no way intended to be discriminatory but is to ensure that an accused person, if convicted by a jury, is convicted entirely because those jurors have formed their own view of his/her guilt from the evidence heard in court uninfluenced by anything other than the judge’s direction.
I can assure you that wherever possible the Scottish Government and other bodies within the justice system will always endeavour to ensure that as many people as possible are able to perform the civic duty of jury service. Specifically in relation to those with a hearing impairment, courts in Scotland are generally sound enhanced and most are either fitted with Baker Sound Induction Loop (SIL) or Phonic Ear System to assist a person with hearing difficulties to participate as a juror.

I responded :

Thank you kindly for this response. In [my earlier] email I specifically suggested to the Justice Secretary, Mr MacAskill :

I would urge you and colleagues in government to amend the legislation around this aspect of the criminal justice system to allow communication support workers to enter jury rooms in support of their clients and so enable deaf and hearing impaired people to serve on Scotland's jury service.

Can I ask you to read your response and then tell me where in it you respond, on behalf of the Justice Secretary, to my call for amending the legislation ?

What came back was :

My sincere apologies, I can see that I have not answered you as directly as I should have. The Scottish Government has no current plans to amend legislation in this area.

Justice is often depicted as being blindfolded, to represent the need for justice to be dealt out objectively, fairly, without fear or favour.  The blindfold clearly has as much integrity as an Atos capacity assessment.  It has surely been woven from the discarded luxuriant tresses of the formerly hirsute Work & Pensions Secretary of State, Ian Duncan Smith, for it is able to see if communication support workers are about to enter the jury room in support of deaf jurors.

It is time we updated our concepts of justice.  What we cite as 'justice' must be able to 'hear' clearly.  In turn, 'justice' must ensure all citizens are heard and enabled to 'hear' in all of its processes.