Longer Hearings in the Courts'?
Page 72
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IF a practice direction, issued .recently by the Lord Chief Justice, sitting.in the Divisional' Court, is followed by Licensing Authorities—and they try, as far as possible,: to keep to ordinary law court procedure—application " battles" may be fought out to their bitter ends; and certainly hauliers , finding themselves before magistrates courts facing charges of irregular operation will find it harder in future to secure a ruling of no case to answer.
His Lordship said: "Those of us who sit in the, Divisional Court have the . distinct impression that justices today are being, persuaded all too ' often , to uphold a submission of no case."
He said that such a submission can only be upheld when there has been no evidence to prove an essential element in the alleged offence, and where the evidence. produced by the prosecution has been so discredited as a result of cross-examination, or is so manifestly unreliable, that no reasonable tribunal ' could 'safely convict upon it.
Apart from this,. a tribunal should not in general be called upon to teach a decision' until the whole of the evidence which either side wishes to tender has been placed before it.