Introduction
The purpose of this assignment is to give a clear definition of statutory interpretation and the approaches associated with it. This is so a better understanding can be created on how judges use these approaches to interpret statutes when in court. Statutory interpretation consists of three main rules which are described as the literal rule, the golden rule and the mischief rule. To complete this assignment, each rule of statutory interpretation will be thoroughly explained as well as the question, “How do courts interpret statutes?”
Statutory Interpretation
Before outlining the approaches of statutory interpretation, an individual must understand the exact meaning of statutory interpretation. Statutory interpretation is the procedure in which a court interprets legislation in order to create a better understanding of the statute. Alexis W gives her own definition of this by stating that “Statutory interpretation refers to the process by which a court looks at a statute and determines what it means.” The reason that courts have to interpret statutes is because sometimes the words involved can be deemed as confusing and unclear especially as most words in a statute can have more than one meaning. It is important that these words are interpreted accurately in court to ensure the defendant gets the right punishment for the crime they have committed. The words of a statute may sometimes have a straightforward meaning but it is important to understand that this is not always the situation. This is why the role of the judge is to resolve the ambiguity these words can cause.
In order for judges to find the correct meaning of statutes, they must use various methods. Parliament introduced the Interpretation Act 1978 as a guideline when applying statutes such as bills and legislation. Section 6 of the Interpretation Act 1978 clearly states that “In any Act, unless the contrary intention appears; words importing the masculine gender include the feminine, words importing the feminine gender include the masculine, words in the singular include the plural and words in the plural include the singular.” This section of the act helps the judge with general words. To make things more simple for courts, most statutes now include an interpretation section. These interpretation sections outline what the words include and how they must be interpreted. For example, the interpretation section of the Human Rights Act 1998 explains that “‘amend’ includes repeal and apply (with or without modifications), “the Commission” means the European Commission of Human Rights and “declaration of incompatibility” means a declaration under section 4.” These sections within the legislation can be helpful to judges as they know what is expected of them when interpreting statutes in court. Therefore, they are less likely to make a mistake and give the wrong sentence to a defendant.
However, not all courts have interpreted statutes correctly. This may be due to the fact they have been badly drafted. The Brock v DPP (1993) case is an example of this. Section 1 of Dangerous Dogs Act 1991 states that “this section applies to any dog of the type known as the pit bull terrier” and that “no person shall have any dog to which this section applies in his possession or custody.” The interpretation of this statute caused a problem in court. The confusion was if the word ‘type’ has the same meaning as the word ‘breed’. Miss Brock had a dog called ‘Buster’ in her possession that was seen as the type known as the pit bull terrier. As she failed to provide appropriate evidence that her dog was of a pit bull terrier type, the Crown Court concluded that Miss Brock would not be prohibited from having the dog in her possession. The court clarified that “the word ‘type’ is not synonymous with the word ‘breed.’” They explained the decision they made by clarifying that the word “‘type’ has a broader meaning to it than the word ‘breed’” and therefore cannot be identified as having the same definition. This case is only one example of how words in statutes pose a daily challenge to judges in UK courts.
Literal Rule
“These rules and principles of statutory interpretation are not legally binding. They are simply interpretative guidelines and principles the courts have developed over time.” This is important to acknowledge before learning the rules.
The first of many rules of statutory interpretation starts with the literal rule. The literal rule is defined as giving words their literal and ordinary meaning. The courts must interpret words as they are and not interpret them in a way they believe they should be interpreted. Courts must abide by this rule even if the outcome may seem unreasonable. In The Queen v The Judge of the City of London Court (1892) case, Lord Esher made this clear by saying “if the words of an Act are clear, you must follow them, even though they lead to a manifest absurdity.” This ensures that judges must interpret the words of a statute in their ordinary meaning without thinking about the result it will have.
An example of the literal rule is in the Fisher v Bell (1960) case. A shopkeeper had a knife for display in his shop window that was labelled as ‘Ejector knife’. Looking at the Restriction of Offensive Weapons Act 1959 it clearly outlines that “any person who manufactures, sells or hires or offers for sale or hire any knife which has a blade which opens automatically by hand pressure applied to a button shall be guilty of an offence.” This information almost suggests that the shopkeeper must be guilty. However, the judiciary concluded that this shopkeeper was not a victim of any offence. He simply had this knife in his shop window with a price ticket attached and was not offering it for sale as “the law of contract states that having an item in a window is not an intention of sale but is an invitation to treat.” And as the Restriction of Offensive Weapons Act 1959 clearly states that a person should not offer a knife which has a blade for sale, it is certain that this term should be given the literal rule and the shop keeper should not be prosecuted. This case is the perfect example of when the literal rule has been applied in UK courts and how the judiciary have perfectly carried out Parliaments intentions which is a great advantage to the literal rule.
Even though most cases that apply the literal rule have resulted in the appropriate outcome, there have been situations where the literal rule has caused injustice. This injustice means that the public’s confidence in the law will become non-existent. The public may believe that the judges are being unfair and that certain people do not deserve the punishment they have been given. Also, the literal rule is hard to apply in some cases. For example, if an individual impersonates a dead person. How can Parliament know that a human being would do such a wrong thing like this? Therefore, it is impossible to make a perfectly drafted law for every possible thing that can be done in the world. This means that it can be hard for judges to apply the literal rule if they have no statute to relate too. This can end up in judges giving their own opinions on what the outcome should be and this is not what their role entails.
Golden Rule
The golden rule is defined as words that are given their plain and ordinary meaning to the extent that they do not cause absurdity. This is like the literal rule although if the court come across an interpretation that leads to absurdity, they can avoid it by using the golden rule. Sharon Hanson explains that “this rule states that the literal rule should be followed except on those occasions when to apply the literal rule would lead to absurd results or go against public policy.” The golden rule can be interpreted in two ways, by using the narrow approach and the wide approach.
An example of the narrow approach of the golden rule is in the R v Allen (1872) case. Section 57 of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861 evidently states that “Whosoever, being married, shall marry any other person during the life of the former husband or wife, shall be guilty of felony.” The challenge that this caused in court was in relation to the word ‘marry’. In what way, should this word be taken? The court came to the decision that the word ‘marry’ should be given the definition as “going through the form and ceremony of marriage with another person.” The word ‘marry’ can also mean to become legally married, but as the defendant was already married to someone else it only made sense to the judiciary to apply the general meaning of the word. If the judges were to apply the other meaning of the word, this would have led to bigamy being legal and that would result in an absurd decision.
The wider approach to the golden rule is the Adler v George (1964) case. Section 3 of the Official Secrets Act 1920 outlines that “no person in the vicinity of any prohibited place shall obstruct, knowingly mislead or otherwise interfere with the chief officer or a superintendent or other officer of police or he shall be guilty of misdemeanour.” The defendant argued that because he was actually in the prohibited place and not in the vicinity of it, that he should not be found guilty. This is where the golden rule is applied. The judiciary decided that the term ‘in the vicinity of’ will be interpreted to ‘in or in the vicinity of’. If the court decided to use the first term, it would suggest that the defendant would be innocent as they were near the prohibited place and not in it and that would be an absurd decision. They made this decision to make clear that whether you are near or in the vicinity of the prohibited place, it is not right to obstruct it.
Mischief Rule
The mischief rule is defined as allowing the judge more discretion than the literal and golden rule. The court will look at what the law was before the new act was passed so they can understand Parliament’s intention. The mischief rule is the oldest of the rules and should only be applied when there is ambiguity in the statute.