PM targets 'time-wasting' appeals

Written By Unknown on Senin, 19 November 2012 | 19.12

19 November 2012 Last updated at 05:52 ET

David Cameron has promised to crack down on "time-wasting" caused by the "massive growth industry" in legal challenges to government policy.

The prime minister told business leaders he would "get a grip" on people forcing unnecessary delays.

Judicial review applications would cost more, with less time put aside to to apply and fewer chances to appeal.

Mr Cameron also said the government was "too slow" at cutting the deficit, and pledged to speed up the process.

And he said the government would end "equality impact assessments", which need to be carried out when new policy or legislation is introduced. He insisted that "bureaucratic nonsense" was not necessary to ensuring the rights of different sexes, races and religions were upheld.

'Hopeless causes'

Individuals and organisations can seek a judicial review if they are think a decision by a public body has been made unlawfully.

The review, carried out by a judge, looks only at the way the decision was reached - rather than whether it was correct or not.

A recent example was Virgin's successful challenge against the awarding of the West Coast Mainline rail franchise to First Group. It was found there had been "significant flaws" in decision-making.

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It will be fascinating to see how and whether the prime minister's growth-promoting judicial-review changes survive the scrutiny of Whitehall. Will his war on 'i-dotting' be stymied by 't-crossing'?"

End Quote

But there are hundreds of other examples, some of which the government says are unnecessary.

In his address to the CBI conference in London, the prime minister said the legal right to a judicial review of decisions, including those on major infrastructure projects, had grown out of control, insisting: "We urgently need to get a grip on this.

"So here's what we're going to do: reduce the time limit when people can bring cases; charge more for reviews - so people think twice about time-wasting."

It is unclear yet how much the fees would rise by for review applications or by how much the three-month time limit for applications might be cut.

But Mr Cameron said that "instead of giving hopeless cases up to four bites of the cherry to appeal a decision, we will halve that to two".

Downing Street figures show more than 11,000 applications for judicial review were made in 2011, compared with just 160 in 1975.

In his speech, Mr Cameron argued for less Whitehall bureaucracy and greater emphasis on the pursuit of economic growth.

David Cameron

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David Cameron: "If Christopher Columbus had an advisory committee he would probably still be stuck in the dock"

He argued that government was "too slow in getting stuff done" and that civil servants must appreciate delays were felt in "businesses going bust, jobs being lost" and "livelihoods being destroyed".

"Consultations, impact assessments, audits, reviews, stakeholder management, securing professional buy-in, complying with EU procurement rules, assessing sector feedback - this is not how we became one of the most powerful, prosperous nations on earth," he said.

"It's not how you get things done so I am determined to change this."

Mr Cameron drew a historical analogy, saying: "When this country was at war in the '40s, Whitehall underwent a revolution.

"Normal rules were circumvented. Convention was thrown out. As one historian put it, everything was thrown at 'the overriding purpose' of beating Hitler.

"Well, this country is in the economic equivalent of war today - and we need the same spirit. We need to forget about crossing every 't' and dotting every 'i' - and we need to throw everything we've got at winning in this global race."

Mr Cameron added: "In the '50s it took us eight years to design and build the first 50 miles of the M1. Today it can take that long just to widen one section of a motorway.

"So we are speeding things up. Since we came to office we haven't just announced a load of road and railways schemes - yes - we have actually got diggers on the ground on the A23, the M62, the M4, M5 and M6.

"What's more, it's our ambition to cut the time it takes to upgrade our roads in half."


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