Do you know what TikTok is? Then you might make a good magistrate, says Ministry of Justice The Ministry of Justice in England and Wales has launched what it sees as the biggest recruitment drive in the magistrate system's 650-year history, to address the backlog in cases partly caused by the pandemic. A £1m marketing campaign aims to boost numbers by 4,000 or a third of the current workforce. Teachers, bricklayers, …
Observing a few cases would soon dispel any notion that any magistrate or judge would be out of touch. As the slogan used to go, "all human life is there".
I did - very briefly - consider it when I retired, largely as a matter of curiosity as to what it looked like from the other side of the witness box. Very briefly because I looked at the bumf about training and decided it seemed to be all in managerial-sounding jargon.
this a couple of years ago, but its not for me.
Partly because you'll have your hands tied by the sentencing guidelines laid down by the home office(and the clerk of the court really does all the hard work), but because , as a police friend said to me, "You'll get sick of seeing the same repeat customers again and again and you'll not be able to do a damn thing about it"
Surely guidance is just that - guidance and as such the magistrate is free to ignore it if they see fit.
Thus those 'repeat customers' could well find themselves exhausting the magistrate's patience quite quickly and suffering the (probably well deserved) consequences..
I can almost hear them bleating about guidelines as they're led away to begin a year's stretch!
As Doctor Syntax said, he considered this when he retired. As did I. Because when we are still working we're...well...., working .
Most of those " Teachers, bricklayers, stay-at-home mums," are busy teaching, sticking bricks together or staying at home being mums. And in the case of the latter, if they wanted and were able to go out to work, presumably, mostly they'd take paid jobs, just like the teachers and bricklayers and everyone else.
But it didn't answer the question of if I'd be allowed to order beheadings or not.
What's the point of being up on the bench & getting to pound the gavel if you can't order "OFF with their HEAD!"?
I mean, I'd *volunteer* to do the job if I got to do that, but not being able to do it AND unpaid?
*Comical pout*
Don' wanna. Hurrumph... =-)p
So you sign up, you work your years gaining experience and getting good at being a Magistrate, you turn 70 and.. you get sacked.
Maybe if they have a shortage they shouldn't be turfing out 5% (if 49% are over 60, in ten years 100% of those will be 70) of magistrates each year for nothing more than 'not being 69 any more'.
Magistrates need to volunteer a minimum of 13 days service each year, which the Ministry believes means the role can fit "easily alongside full-time employment and caring responsibilities."
.. well it actually says 26 half days - devil in the detail, can you guarantee its just 13 days or will some instances be half days only leading to more than 13 working days affected.
.. But, as people have said - busy working. Magistrate unpaid with PITA expenses system that's not fit for purpose and means you are worse off than working.
I would imagine magistrates mainly older as they have either retired or can afford to work just a few days a week and so have plenty of free time.
Wonder if the over 50% female figure is because of some of the women not needing to work as partners income enough for the household?
.. as I know some relatively young female magistrates* with wealthy husbands so the women do not need to work and its yet another "hobby" for them (feel sorry for any poor low level crim in front of them as they really have no concept of how shit life is & how its near impossible to not get into debt when you live in poverty)
* Not that any of them are great friends of mine as their right wing politics totally at odds with my views, friends of friends or people met through work over the years where you just have to politely keep occasional contact & feign interest in what they are doing just to oil the wheels of expected social behaviour.
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