New white paper: Defensible Court Naming Schemes
A taxonomy of lawful, defective, and fraudulent designations for magistrates’ courts in England and Wales
I am releasing the first version of my white paper on magistrates’ court naming schemes. It exposes how so-called “ghost courts” — labels with no statutory foundation — are being used to issue summonses and secure convictions in England and Wales. When process flows from a court that does not exist in law, the safeguard of a tribunal “established by law” collapses. What begins with defective names ends with imprisonment without warrant: the essence of tyranny. Proximity to a lawful designation is no defence; a counterfeit that looks “close enough” is still a fraud, and fraud cannot be the basis of justice.
Executive summary
This white paper examines the legality and constitutional defensibility of magistrates’ court naming schemes in England and Wales. It addresses a growing problem: the use of non-statutory, hybrid, or fictitious court names — “ghost courts” — on summonses and orders. Such practices create the appearance of authority where no lawful warrant exists.
The stakes are profound. Article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights guarantees a fair hearing before a “tribunal established by law.” Criminal Procedure Rules (CrimPR 7.4) require a summons to identify the court that issued it. Where a summons bears the name of a tribunal that does not exist in statute or statutory instrument, the proceedings are not a harmless irregularity but a jurisdictional nullity. Justice cannot be founded on misrepresentation.
The paper offers a taxonomy of naming practices, ranked by defensibility:
Tier 1 (Highly Defensible): Clear statutory tether or accepted shorthand, leaving no doubt about the tribunal’s identity.
Tier 1.5–2.5 (Omission, Shorthand, Administrative Labels): Defective but potentially curable if the underlying tribunal is identifiable and no prejudice arises.
Tier 3 (Thin Ice Hybrids): Confusing blends of statutory and administrative labels, which risk undermining jurisdiction and public confidence.
Tier 4 (Fraudulent Misrepresentation): Names that fabricate non-existent courts or present hybrids as statutory entities. These are void ab initio and cannot be cured.
The practical consequences of defective naming are serious:
Defendants are denied the certainty of a tribunal established by law.
Audit and appeal are obstructed when records cannot be traced to a statutory court.
Confusion proliferates across Single Justice Procedure notices, summonses, listings, and enforcement orders.
Accountability is diluted, with responsibility hidden behind invented labels.
The remedy is simple but non-negotiable: authority must be declared, not simulated. Every court name must tether openly to its statutory foundation. “Close enough” is counterfeit; fraud’s shadow cannot be allowed to fall over the rule of law.
Key Recommendations:
Require every summons and order to state the statutory root for the named court.
Prohibit non-statutory labels and hybrids unless explicitly cross-referenced to a statutory base.
Publish and maintain a transparent register of all lawful court names and venues.
Commission an independent audit of Single Justice Procedure cases for ghost court usage.
Establish statutory sanctions for issuing process in the name of fictitious courts.
Unless corrected, the present drift towards administrative convenience and opaque labelling risks systemic failure. If courts may compel obedience without lawful warrant, imprisonment without warrant is the next step — the very definition of tyranny. Safeguarding lawful naming is therefore not a technicality but a constitutional necessity.
Significance of this document
The true significance of this white paper is not only legal but civilisational. It demonstrates how authority can be simulated through ghost courts, and how that simulation collapses when subjected to disciplined scrutiny. What looks like a technical irregularity is, in fact, a lens onto the deeper fracture between state power and public trust.
Cultural: It punctures the illusion that law is the exclusive preserve of judges and officials, showing that ordinary citizens can demand the warrant of authority and expose when none exists.
5GW: The paper itself is a weapon — turning procedural forensics and AI into asymmetric firepower against institutional deception.
Political: It signals that the covenant between citizen and state is failing, as trust disintegrates when authority is simulated rather than declared.
Historic: It marks a turning point where constitutional truth escapes the state’s monopoly and can be forced into the open by determined individuals.
Why this matters now
This is not a matter of dusty procedure or academic interest. Magistrates’ courts process over a million cases each year, many under the Single Justice Procedure. If the naming of courts is defective at the root, then the validity of vast numbers of summonses and convictions comes into question. What looks like an obscure technicality is in fact a mass due-process risk.
We have already seen in the Horizon scandal how “minor irregularities” in legal and technical process can metastasise into national injustice. The same dynamic is at work here. When administrative convenience trumps statutory warrant, error and fraud scale rapidly. What begins with a traffic summons issued in the name of a ghost court could just as easily extend to more serious matters, with citizens denied liberty on the basis of a fiction.
The danger is not hypothetical. By tolerating “close enough” naming, we normalise counterfeit authority. Today it is a parking fine; tomorrow it may be imprisonment without lawful warrant. Once the state demonstrates that it can compel obedience without tethering itself to law, the line into tyranny has already been crossed. The time to act is now, before the practice hardens into custom and the exception becomes the rule.
Call to action
This white paper is only the first step. Its value lies in how it is used — by citizens, journalists, and legislators who recognise the danger of courts that exist in name only. I invite readers to test the taxonomy in their own cases, to demand statutory warrants for every summons, and to press for parliamentary oversight of Single Justice Procedure practices. Journalists should investigate how many convictions rest on ghost courts. MPs should ask why HMCTS permits fraudulent labels to persist. And every citizen should remember: obedience is owed only to lawful authority, never to counterfeit.
The line between a free society and tyranny is drawn here.
It may not be the most elegant piece I’ve ever published, but it is certainly among the most consequential. I welcome feedback. My hope is that readers within HMCTS, the CPS, and the Government Legal Department recognise that halting an unlawful practice, however awkward, is far less damaging than continuing it knowingly. Once the full truth about the Covid era is out, tolerance for further overreach will be nil. The choice for institutions is simple: correct course voluntarily now, or face forced correction later under conditions of zero public patience.
Clear, concise, and to the point. Well done, Martin!