STATE PAYS JURYMEN

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 70, Issue 114, 27 February 1950, Page 6

STATE PAYS JURYMEN

EFFECT OF NEW ACT Company directors lined up ■ with dustmen, bakers and butchers with clerks and shop assistants, at a special > office in the Law Courts in London, says the “Daily Mail.” ; They were in the queue oF 83 jurors ' waiting to draw their State pay from I Mr W. E. Jacobs, newly appointed . jury officer. And they were the first jurymen to do so. ‘ Until yesterday jurymen were paid Is a day. Those who sat on “special ' juries” received a guinea. Costs were ■ borne by the litigants in each case. Now under the new Juries Act the State pays the jurymen, who can ; claim on three counts—travelling expenses, loss of earnings, and subsis : j tence (which means food). One man yesterday received 275., j instead of the shilling which most of | the jurymen were expecting. He was Mr George A. Bryan, of Palmers Green, N. He said: “I f am still a quid out on the day. I am a taximan, an owner-driver, and on an average earn 45s a day. I have claimed and got the limit, 275. “I Was Late” “They allowed me two bob for fare. But when I got to the Holborn tube I was a bit late, and I took a taxi from there, which cost two bob. “I shall be another quid down tomorrow. Blokes dike me should be excused jury duty. Other blokes in there get paid by their firms for the time they take off—l don’t. “In the old days of a bob a nob I’d have been two quid out, so I suppose I mustn’t grumble really.” Travelling allowance was third-class fare from home to the Law Courts. Taxi fares were not allowed. Loss of earnings was allowed at the rate of 10s for four hours and £1 for more thaji four hours. Subsistence worked out at 2s Gd for four hours, . 5s for over.

Half the S3,sat for cases heard, and the other half were paid as jurors in waiting.