Justices of the Peace Act 1949

23Existing and former justices' clerks, etc.

(1)A justices' clerk holding office immediately before the date of the coming into force of section nineteen of this Act shall be deemed for the purposes of this Act to have been appointed by the magistrates' courts committee and, subject to the provisions of this section, any persons then employed by him to assist him in the performance of the duties appertaining to that clerkship shall be transferred to the employment of the committee on the said date.

(2)The salary payable under the said section nineteen to a justices' clerk to whom the foregoing subsection applies shall be fixed with due regard to any additional duties imposed on him as justices' clerk by section twenty-one of this Act and to any remuneration formerly payable in respect of the duties so imposed on him.

(3)Subsection (1) of this section shall not transfer to the employment of the magistrates' courts committee from that of a justices' clerk a person who immediately before the said date is employed by the clerk for purposes not connected with any clerkship to justices held by him, and a person employed by a justices' clerk shall not be transferred by that subsection to the employment of the committee as respects his employment by the clerk in connection with a clerkship to justices outside the area of the committee.

(4)Where immediately before the said date a person is justices' clerk and collecting officer at the same court, subsections (1) and (3) of this section shall apply in relation to persons then employed by him as if his duties as collecting officer of that court had been duties appertaining to the clerkship.

(5)Where immediately before the said date a person to whom subsection (1) of this section does not apply is collecting officer of any court and devotes substantially the whole of his time to his duties as collecting officer of that court, he shall be transferred on the said date to the employment of the magistrates' courts committee as a member of the staff provided for the clerk of that court.

(6)Where the collecting officer of any court is transferred as mentioned in the last foregoing subsection, any person who immediately before the said date is employed by him to assist him in the performance of his duties as collecting officer of that court, and who devotes substantially the whole of his time to that employment, shall also be so transferred.

(7)Where a person who immediately before the said date is employed by a justices' clerk or collecting officer is transferred by this section to the employment of a magistrates' courts committee, the terms and conditions on which he is then employed by the justices' clerk or collecting officer, so far as they remain applicable, shall apply to his employment by the committee; and the terms and conditions on which a person is transferred to the employment of a magistrates' courts committee by subsection (5) of this section shall be such as in the opinion of the magistrates' courts committee are on the whole not less beneficial to him than those on which he held office as collecting officer.

(8)In relation to any person to whom the 1937 Act applies by virtue of the last foregoing section, being either—

(a)a person who before the said date has been a justices' clerk or employed by such a clerk in connection with the clerkship; or

(b)a person who on the said date is transferred to the employment of a magistrates' courts committee by subsection (5) or (6) of this section;

the provisions set out in Part II of the Fifth Schedule to this Act shall have effect as well as those set out in Part I thereof.

(9)Paragraph (g) of Part III of the Second Schedule to the 1937 Act shall continue, notwithstanding the repeal of section twenty of that Act, to apply to a person who has been a contributory employee by virtue of the said section twenty; and in the case of such a person any rules made under section one of the Superannuation (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, 1948 (which relates to national service), so far as they refer to an employment in which, immediately before he left it, he was a contributory employee by virtue of the said section twenty, shall have effect as if that section had continued in force and the foregoing provisions of this Part of this Act had not been passed.

(10)Provision corresponding to subsections (8) and (9) of this section may, in relation to any local Act scheme, be made by any order modifying the scheme under the last foregoing section.

(11)For the purposes of this section, a person's employment by any justices or by the Middlesex standing joint committee to assist a justices' clerk shall be deemed employment by that clerk ; and in relation to a person who has been a contributory employee by virtue of section four hundred and eighteen of the Middlesex County Council Act, 1944, subsection (9) of this section shall apply with the substitution of references to that section for references to section twenty of the 1937 Act and of a reference to paragraph (f) of the Fifth Schedule to the said Act of 1944 for the reference to paragraph (g) of Part III of the Second Schedule to the 1937 Act.

(12)For the purposes of this section, the expression " collecting officer " means collecting officer of a court of summary jurisdiction appointed under the Affiliation Orders Act, 1914.