Statutory Interpretation

Statutory Interpretation

1. Rules of Interpretation

   • The literal rule
     • judge reads the statutes as a who;e, and puts the words into context. Words are given their plain, ordinary, grammatical meaning regardless of outcome,
     • Lord Esher in the case of R v Judge of the City of London Court (1892) : "...if the words of an Act are clear, you must follow them, even though they lead to a manifest absurdity (..) the court has nothing to do with the question of whether the legislature has commited and absurdity."
     • Whitely V Chappell the Poor Law Amendment Act 1851- stated it was an offence to 'impersonate any person entitled to vote'. D cast a vote using the identity of a deceased person. Held; taken literally, a dead person is not entitled to vote, therfore D could not be guily of the offence
     • LNER v Berriman - railway worker was killed while oiling the track. Fatal Accidents 1846 provided that compensation was payable on death of worker while 'relaying Held: taken literally, oiling track is not relaying nor repairing but rather 'maintaining', so widow was not entitled to compensation
     • Advantages
       • clarity about paticular words and phrases
       • exact words set by Parliament being used- fulfilling what Parliament want to acheive
       • lawyers can expect to follow the exact meaning of law
     • Disadvantages
       • not fully flexible., leads to absurd outcomes (Whiteley v Chappell)
       • Unfair outcomes (e.g widow in LNER v Berriman didn't gain compensation
       • words can have more than one meaning