Lord Jauncey Pros And Cons

Lord Jauncey commented on the anomaly that the appellant had mentioned. The anomaly being that unlike a sheriff principal having served for less than ten years, a sheriff principal who has been removed from office for being unfit for service due to inability having served for longer than ten years would not be paid an annuity. Lord Jauncey said “Why such a distinction was drawn is not obvious.”
He also thinks that although the addition of the fourth proviso to section 20 of the Sheriff Courts (Scotland) Act 1907 may produce an anomaly, he still does not believe it supports having a narrow construction of the word “inability” in section 12 (1) of the Sheriff Courts (Scotland) Act 1971.
Due to age and infirmity in the acts of 1838 and 1907 being treated as causing disablement and possibly meriting the payment of an annuity yet inability in the acts of 1877, 1898 and 1907 is treated as justifying removable from office, Lord Jauncey thought it would be surprising if inability were to be merely construed as another way of saying physical or mental infirmity. He thought that if inability were
Lord Jauncey also says that in his view, section 12 is intended to cover all cases where a sheriff does not retire voluntarily but is unfit for office. Section 12 (1) specifies that the senior judges must either find sheriffs unfit for office by the reasons specified in the section or fit for office meaning there is no middle ground. He believes the reasons specified for unfitness must be wide because it would be absurd if the senior judges had to report a sheriff as fit for duty despite thinking that due to some personality or behavioural issue not amounting to mental illness he was