against mandatory jury service

[happyharpist]

A friend of mine has started this petition against mandatory jury service. Please sign if you agree!

I advocate for abolishing compulsory jury service due to its potential impact on individuals' lives, causing disruptions, financial strain, and therefore potentially compromising the fairness of trials.

We believe compelling individuals without their explicit consent infringes on their rights. The obligation to serve on a jury is imposed without voluntary agreement, disrupting personal and professional lives. We consider that this lack of consent challenges the democratic principle that citizens should have a say in the responsibilities imposed on them. If jurors are grappling with anger, stress, or personal concerns such as lack of childcare or financial hardship, it could impact their ability to make unbiased decisions.

Totally against this and won’t be signing. A minor disruption to a jurors life is irrelevant in ensuring that trials are conducted. Unfortunately for victims there is a huge backlog in cases so ideally more people should be called as jurors.

You can get excused once but still may be called again as a juror.

It’s a couple of weeks sitting in a court building not national service in the military in a war zone.

Most people don’t want to do jury service. I don’t want to do jury service. Certainly some cases can be upsetting but many are not. In some cases it can cause financial or practical difficulties.

But I accept juries are important in discharging our justice system and the above are consequences of this. And so I will do it when called. So no I won’t be signing.

I totally disagree. It has to be a cross section of society to work.

So your friend is suggesting we have no mothers with young children on juries because it's inconvenient for them for example.

We would end up where people would be being judged by a narrow pool of people.

Better to campaign for proper reimbursement for any financial losses.

I would find it really interesting, but have never been called. There are points in my life (as everyone) where it would have been really inconvenient, but I would have had to work round it.

You can get excused once but still may be called again as a juror.

And that's completely reasonable. Unfortunately I have a child with severe OCD and a chronic physical illness, so until he shows signs of improvement and is more independent, I'm unable to do it. But I accept that if that happens, I have an obligation to serve as a juror and I would absolutely want to.

“I know it's essentially a lottery but I still don't know why some people get called up umpteen times whilst others not at all.
For example my Dad did it twice whilst still under 60 & he was moving all over the country but my mother never got asked despite living in the same place for decades!”

Because it is random. In any random pick, some people will get picked more than once and some not at all, if the system doesn’t actively exclude previous jurors.

We will end up with Juries of retired people , not representative of the broader society

Sorry OP, but your support for your friend's petition is misguided. I've done jury service and will willingly do it again. Reducing the pool of potential jurors is not a good idea. As others have said, campaigning for reimbursement of any financial loss is the better idea.

I won't sign it as its a bad idea.

I've not actually done jury duty - I was unwell when first called and had a holiday booked for the second time - but I do agree with the principle that it is random selection.

We live in a democracy and occasionally that means we need to do things to protect that democracy and jury duty is one of them.

Your friend is a nutcase

Really bad idea, OP.

Shockingly bad idea - I see it as my civic duty to do jury service if/when called and I have a very low opinion of people who think they should be excused for pathetic reasons (yet no doubt would expect a jury if they were on trial for something serious).

You can get excused once but still may be called again as a juror.

I have permanent excusal.

I am autistic and have complex PTSD.

This isn't true if you're in the UK.

We need better reimbursement for losses, if it was just voluntary only retired and people in certain jobs that make up the salary would do it.

Nope, won’t be signing. I served on a jury once. Fascinating, eye-opening and every single person in the very diverse SE1 group took the responsibility very seriously.

If your friend wants to be part of a society, she needs to do her bit too.

I’m almost 60 and have never been called. I wonder how they choose a jury, given that some people have been called numerous times.

OP, what alternative is there? What if everyone said no after the non-compulsory laws are put in place? I come from a country without jury trial (which in my country I support due to prevailing attitudes and extremely low levels of education and very poor understanding of science and logical arguments). But having only one person (the judge) make a decision opens up the system to mass abuse through corruption. You only have to bribe one person. Not even bribe them. If the judge is a spouse abuser, then victims of spousal abuse become disadvantage because he can give the abuser wiggle room.
Also OP, on average, how often in a lifetime is a citizen called up for jury duty (and hence has life significantly interrupted) that we should abolish this citizen responsibility? In 2016 it was 40%. In 2018 in England and Wales it was 35% in a life time, a citizen would be called once. I think its just one of the few things we can and should do if we want a functioning liberal democracy but happy to hear alternatives

I agree with the majority here. Having it from a narrower pool of society is a dangerous path to go down.

I could see an argument for better financial recompense but not a change of the system.

Another one agreeing with the majority. Allowing jury service to be optional would lead to only a narrow cross section of society volunteering and potentially introducing bias into it.

I would be supportive of more financial support of those called up though.

I've been called twice! There's no maximum I think.

What absolute nonsense.
Will be a rather short petition @happyharpist .

I’d happily sign it, hate jury duty, don’t think it should be mandatory.

all these criminals who have gone through the court system have more human rights than most law abiding citizens. My right should be to say no I don’t want to be on a jury.

PP are talking about civic duty, my civic duty is to be a law abiding citizen, everyone else should do the same and we would have no need for jury’s.

No , I know somebody who has been called three times.