Launch of the Northern Ireland Law Commission
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| Leo O'Reilly (DFP Second Permanent Secretary), Prof. Sean Doran (Commissioner), Mr Neil Faris (Commissioner), NIO Minister Paul Goggins MP, The Hon. Mr Justice Morgan (Chairman), Judena Goldring (Chief Executive), Mr Robert Hunniford (Commissioner) |
On Tuesday 1st April 2008, the formal launch of the new Northern Ireland Law Commission took place in its new offices at Linum Chambers, 2 Bedford Square, Bedford Street, Belfast.
At the launch reception the Chairman Mr Justice Morgan said:
“The Commission is an independent statutory body which is charged with the responsibility of reviewing and systematically developing the law of Northern Ireland. The work of the Commission, therefore, has the potential to impact on the lives of many citizens in Northern Ireland and the establishment of the Commission represents an opportunity to achieve local solutions for technically complex areas where law reform agencies have shown themselves effective in other jurisdictions.”
The background
Mr Justice Morgan set this out at the launch:
“Independent law reform has been something of a late developer in this jurisdiction. Law commissions were established by the newly elected Labour government in 1965 in England and Wales and Scotland and in 1975 the Irish government established the Law Reform Commission. It was not until 1989 that a Law Reform Advisory Committee was established in this jurisdiction with a remit confined to civil law. Despite its modest budget with the support of various enthusiastic Directors of the Office of Law Reform and secretaries of the Committee, a number of whom are here today, it made a considerable contribution to the development of legislative change in this jurisdiction. Indeed during the tenure of Paul Girvan as the chair of the Committee it could rightly be said that it probably represented the best value for money law reform agency in the world. That is quite a reputation to live up to.”