The written law of the United Kingdom is known as statutory law, also identified as legislation. These laws are created and implemented by Parliament and enforced by various authorities. This assignment aims to provide a better illustration of the regulatory interpretation and the methodologies associated with it. Furthermore, it shows a more complete understanding of how courts use these methodologies to interpret laws when necessary. There are three main rules associated with statutory interpretation described as the literal rule, the golden rule, and the evil rule. This assignment will be completed by setting; the reasons why courts use these rules will be explained in detail. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Before outlining the regulatory interpretation methodologies, it is important to understand their correct importance. Statutory interpretation is the process by which courts interpret legislation or an act of parliament to better understand the statute. The House of Lords receives cases and these cases deal with statutory interpretation, the words of a statute can have a simple meaning, however, sometimes courts have to interpret statutes because those words can be confusing and indistinct to understand as they can have different meanings. These words must be understood precisely so that defendants receive the right sentence for the crimes of which they are accused, and this is one of the reasons why the role of judges is to clarify the uncertainty that these words can cause. To get closer to the correct method parliaments created the Interpretation Act 1978 to guide judges in applying statutes such as bills and legislation and the Interpretation Act 1978 states that “In any law, unless it appears l contrary intention; words that import the masculine gender include the feminine, words that import the feminine gender include the masculine, words in the singular include the plural, and words in the plural include the singular. (Sage Salsa, 2017) This part of the act is designed to help judges with general words. Nowadays, most statutes contain an interpretation section to facilitate the courts. These sections summarize what the words contain and how they should be conducted. Evaluating statutory interpretation requires the use of three explicit statutory provisions. Rules have been established so as to provide an interpretative framework; these rules represent the common approach in terms of examining the meaning of languages used in courts. These are known as the literal rule, the golden rule, and the evil rule. This rule is the first of many rules of statutory interpretation. The literal rule can be defined as giving words as they are given their ordinary and natural meaning. Courts normally apply the literal rule before applying it to any other rule, although, when this rule is applied, the law is read word for word and the courts are tasked with interpreting this word as it really is and not with explaining it as where they think it should be explained. As an example of the literal rule case of Fisher v Bell (1960), where a retailer had a knife to display in his shop window. “Any person who makes, sells, hires out or offers for sale or hire a knife having a blade which opens automatically by the pressure of the hand applied to a button shall be guilty of an offence” (Essay Sauce, 2017) Restriction of Offensive Weapons (1959) Essay on Salsa,2017). This law practically recommends that the dealer be found guilty. But the court ruled that this retailer was not the victim of any crime. The owner only had the knife in the window with a price and was not selling it. Although the Restriction of Offensive Weapons Act of 1959 states that an individual should not bargain for a knife blade for sale, it is certain that this term should be given the literal rule and the shop owner should not be prosecuted. Many cases involving the literal rule have caused problems with numbers, there have been circumstances where the literal rule has caused injustice. The public may believe that judges are biased and that some people do not deserve the sentence they were given. Furthermore, the literal rule can be very difficult to apply in some cases. This rule has the same principles as the literal rule and is used when the literal interpretation causes an unfair result, in other words, the golden rule is a modification of the literal rule and allows judges to look at words in context. The court always begins the case with the literal rule approach, however, if this rule fails in its logic, then the golden rule may apply. The golden rule can be interpreted in two ways; a narrow approach and a broad approach. The term narrow approach reflects the judge's view of how the golden rule should be applied and has more than one meaning; in this case, the judge applies the meaning that best suits the situation in which the word is interpreted. The cases R v Allen 1872 and Adler v Georgia 1964 are probably the best case that exemplifies the use of the golden rule, the case R v Allen, the defendant Allen was accused of adultery. Section 57 of the Offenses Against the Person Act 1861 evidently states that “whoever is married and marries any other person during the lifetime of the former husband/wife shall be guilty of bigamy”. (Legislation.gov.uk, 2002) The challenge raised in court was over the word marry. So, to make sense, the court decided that the word married should also mean a legal form and ceremony of marriage to another person. However, since the defendant was already married, it only made sense for the judges to implement the general meaning of the word. If the judges had applied another meaning of the word, it would otherwise have led to bigamy and could have resulted in an absurd verdict. The broad approach of Adler v George 1964 showed that the defendant was charged with obstructing a guard in the execution of his duty as the 1920 Act states that no person in the vicinity or the chief officer shall be obstructed or the person shall be convicted as guilty. The defendant argued that since he was in the prohibited place and not in its vicinity, he should not be found guilty. Furthermore, if the court agreed to use the first term, this would mean that the accused would be innocent and it would be an absurd decision. The courts have come across this decision to make it clear that if a person is near or near the prohibited place, it is not right to obstruct him. The rule of evil is the oldest rule. This rule is a principle used to interpret laws, judges can apply statutory interpretation to find out the intention of Parliament, but this rule requires the court to first examine what the law was before the statute, in order to find out what gap or damage the statute intended to cover. The court is therefore essential in interpreting the law to bridge the gap. The rule summarizes the Heydon case (1584), where it was said that for the correct interpretation of a law it is necessary 18.
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