JUDGES TO USE SUMMARY POWERS TO PUNISH SPARINGLY

• Date: 06 February 2019

"Whether the contempt is in the face of the Court or not in the face of the Court, it is important that it should be borne in mind by Judges that the Court should use its summary powers to punish for contempt sparingly. It is important to emphasise the fact that Judges should not display undue degree of sensitiveness about this matter of contempt and that they all must act with restraint on these occasions. We recall the observation of Lord Russell of Kilowen in R. v. Gray (1900) 2 Q.B. 36 at p. 41 that "jurisdiction to deal with contempt summarily should be exercised with scrupulous care and only when the case is clear and beyond reasonable doubt." In the case Shandasami v. King Emperor (1945) A.C. 264 at p. 268, Lord Goddard, C.J. in delivering the judgment of the Court said: - "Dealing first with the appellants reference to the conduct of the Bar, their Lordships share the surprise expressed by the Chief Justice when granting the certificate for appeal as to what he described as the somewhat undue degree of sensitiveness displayed in taking so serious a view of what had been said. Their Lordships would, indeed, go further, and say that it would have been more consonant with the dignity of the Bar to have ignored a foolish remark which has been made over and over again, not only by the ignorant, but by people who ought to know better, and, no doubt, will continue to be made so long as there is a profession of advocacy. To treat such words as requiring exercise by the Court of its summary powers of punishment is not only to make a mountain out of a molehill but to give a wholly undeserved advertisement to what had far better have been treated as unworthy of either answer or even notice". The case was an appeal against conviction for contempt of Court where the appellant before the Court had said something contemptuous of counsel against him in a case before the Judge. The Lord Chief Justice at p. 270 of the report continued: - "Their Lordships would once again emphasise what has often been said before, that this...