Sir Brian Leveson’s claim that
there is ‘no right to jury trial’
erects a constitutional straw
man, argues Professor Graham
Zellick KC in NLJ this week. He argues that Leveson dismantles a position almost no-one truly holds, and thereby obscures the deeper issue: the jury’s place within the UK’s constitutional tradition
Although the UK has no codified constitutional rights, Zellick notes that generations of judges—Coke, Blackstone, Devlin, Denning and others—have treated jury trial as a fundamental safeguard woven into the nation’s legal and political history.
While there may be no formal constitutional right, the jury has long been viewed as a cherished public protection whose erosion demands the highest scrutiny. He criticises Leveson for treating the absence of entrenched rights as permission for sweeping reform, and ignoring the jury’s profound symbolic and practical role.
Any reform, he warns, must bear a heavy justificatory burden, given the system’s Grade-I-listed constitutional pedigree.
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