High Court judge Sir Paul Coleridge, disciplined for media comments he made in support of marriage, said the response was ‘disproportionate’, it was reported in December.
The formal warning relates to his involvement in articles for The Times newspaper in December 2012 and for the Telegraph’s website in July 2013.
Sir Paul, speaking about same-sex marriage, told The Times: ‘So much energy and time has been put into this debate for 0.1% of the population, when we have a crisis of family breakdown’. And in his Telegraph arti-cle the judge commented: ‘Stability is the name of the game and comparatively speaking that means marriage’. The Judicial Conduct Investigations Office (JCIO) – the official body that deals with judicial discipline – said the comments amount to judicial misconduct.
Lack of support for marriage
Sir Paul announced in November that he would retire early, partly because of the lack of support from some of his colleagues for his pro-marriage beliefs. He said many agree with him, but won’t say so publicly: ‘With one or two exceptions, they have been very, if quietly, supportive’.
Criticising the formal warning from the JCIO, Sir Paul said: ‘I strongly disagree with the overall conclusion of the JCIO, which underlies this announcement that my occasional comments on the huge social problem of family breakdown or my public support for the Marriage Foundation (MF) amounts to misconduct or brings the judiciary into disrepute. Indeed I think the contrary is true’.
He recognised that his involvement with the MF was unusual, but not incompatible with being a judge.
