The Law Lords
Subtitle: An Account of the Workings of Britain's Highest Judicial Body and the Men Who Preside Over It
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Published: 2000
Language: eng
Format: Hardback
Number of pages: 240
ISBN-13: 9780333725191
Description: "The roughly 700-member House of Lords is not only a legislative body, it is also the final court of appeal for most cases decided in the United Kingdom. These days cases are not heard by the main body of the House of Lords, they are decided by a committee of the House known as the Appellate Committee. There are 12 full-time members on the Committee - the Lords of Appeal in Ordinary. They are judges who have been appointed into the House of Lords specifically to hear appeals, and who do the work of the Appellate Committee." "Lately the Lords of Appeal have been in the news because of the General Pinochet appeal. This case has highlighted the importance of the Appellate Committee - and the fallibility of its members. But despite this recent splash of publicity the public still knows little of the Appellate Committee and its members. This book seeks to change that: it looks at the workings of the Appellate Committee and the work done by the Lords of Appeal. It is based in part on interviews conducted with past and present Appellate Committee members and is intended for anyone who is interested in discovering more about the personal and professional lives of the members of the most eminent and powerful judicial body in the United Kingdom."--Jacket.