Deputy Kirsten Morel made the comments following a States sitting earlier this week, in which he asked Environment Minister John Young what progress had been made to strengthen the legal protection of trees.
The minister said the issue was one of his priorities but that there were ‘considerable drafting delays’ as a result of both Covid-19 and Brexit.
‘The lack of law-drafting resources is often cited by States Members and ministers as a reason why something hasn’t been done,’ said Deputy Morel.
‘I know the law drafters work incredibly hard but as we have seen there is a constant wave of legislation going through the States and we only have so many law drafters – it’s very technical work and it takes time.’
He added that the demand for law drafting was unlikely to reduce in the coming years, and that it ‘could be a really good career’ for more Islanders to take up.
‘Covid obviously took a lot of law drafting time,’ he said. ‘It does feel like that’s an area that needs more funding and needs more people.’
Currently the Legislative Drafting Office consists of six permanent legislative drafters, two temporary legislative drafters, a trainee drafter, an assistant legal adviser seconded from the Law Officers’ Department to assist with Brexit, a legislation editor and two assistant legislation editors.
However, Lucy Marsh-Smith, the department’s principal legislative drafter, said: ‘There are no delays caused by a shortage of drafters, though drafting projects often take longer than hoped. That is for a number of reasons.
‘The drafting instructions may come to us later than expected for various reasons and we rely on policy officers to respond to drafts and queries from us.
‘That is not a criticism of these officers. In a small island people have wide remits and it is a normal part of the policy and law-making processes to take time analysing the detail – it is part of good law-making.’
Ms Marsh-Smith – who has also headed a law-drafting team in the Isle of Man – is encouraging Islanders to pursue a career in the field, and has established a trainee post and started a training programme.
‘When I took over as head in 2018 I decided to change the office complement, which consisted entirely of a permanent cadre of drafters recruited from outside the Island – mainly from the UK,’ she said.
‘I brought in temporary drafters from other jurisdictions, including Canada and Australia, for a wider perspective, but I was also really concerned that the one place we weren’t recruiting from is Jersey. It takes a minimum of five years to train a legislative drafter.’
Anyone who is interested in a career in law drafting can contact Ms Marsh-Smith via email at L.MarshSmith@gov.je.
Additionally, tomorrow will mark 250 years since Jersey’s legislation was first gathered into a single ‘code’, in 1771. The Legislative Drafting Office is celebrating the occasion with the launch of its ‘Beyond 250’ project – which aims to make it easier for Islanders to find the legislation that affects them.
