The judicial review row should not be about lawyers – it is about democracy

The stooshie over judicial review is not about lawyers, although one should be forgiven for thinking otherwise given much of today’s coverage and reaction. Really, it is about the rule of law and representative democracy.

So much of the debate around legal reform (not just judicial review) has been skewed by familiar obsessions with ‘human rights’, ‘lefty lawyers’ and ‘right-wing bastards’. Such media tropes are not created ex nihilo. Public administration has become highly politicised, and all sides play the game. I’ve heard government-types talk about the need to break ‘lefty lawyers’’ perceived monopoly over legal aid and some corners of the judiciary. And I’ve heard said ‘lefty lawyers’ talk in nakedly political terms about employment and immigration cases. Sometimes these lawyers exude the sense that the battle is more important than the outcome; but, to give them credit, their faith runs deep and they were equally contemptuous of the previous government.