Lloyd's Maritime and Commercial Law Quarterly
The Admiralty Registrar: past, present and future
John A Kimbell *
The Admiralty Court in London has had a Registrar since at least 1528. This article describes how the post has evolved over the last 490 years from scribe to full judicial office. It examines the significant contribution made by some of the Registrars to the practice and procedure of the court and, as the office approaches its 500th year, considers options for securing its future.
Introduction
The Admiralty Registrar is defined in the present Civil Procedure Rules, Part 61.1(2) as “the Queen’s Bench Master with responsibility for Admiralty claims”.1 However, another part of the same rule states that the Admiralty Registrar possesses all the powers of the Admiralty Judge, unless a rule or practice direction provides otherwise.2 The present-day Admiralty Registrar is thus a curious hybrid with one foot in the Queen’s Bench Masters’ corridor and the other in the Admiralty (and Commercial) Court. This hybrid state is not inherent to the post but is rather the accidental result of a recruitment problem in 1986, following the death of the last full-time Admiralty Registrar, James Rochford. For the first 458 years of its existence (up to 1986), the Admiralty Registrar was a free-standing office within the Admiralty Court alongside the Admiralty Judge and the Admiralty Marshal.3
One might be forgiven for assuming that the Admiralty Registrar performs very much the same function for the Admiralty Court as any other Queen’s Bench Master performs in relation to the civil litigation handled by the other puisne judges of the Queen’s Bench Division. However, the role of the Admiralty Registrar is in fact highly specialised and it has deeper historical roots than the current definition of the role contained in CPR Pt 61.1(2) might suggest. The Registrar plays a vital role in the work of the Admiralty Court, including case management of all Admiralty claims, dealing with a wide variety of interlocutory applications, the arrest and release of vessels, the management of limitation funds and limitation proceedings, as well as any other matter referred to him
* QC; Barrister and Rechtsanwalt at Quadrant Chambers, London. The author would like to thank MN Howard QC and John Knott for their comments on an earlier draft of this article.
1. CPR Pt 61.1(2)(l).
2. CPR Pt 61.1(4). The origin of this broad delegation of power is almost certainly the pre-judicature Acts practice in the High Court of Admiralty of the Registrar sitting as surrogate of the Admiralty Judge. However, as a result of the proviso to the delegation of power in CPR 61.1(4), the Admiralty Registrar may not, for example, make freezing or search orders (CPR Pt 2 PD 2, para.2) or make an order for sale of a vessel before judgment (CPR PD 61, para.9.3).
3. The Admiralty Registrar is still identified as an independent judicial office in the Senior Courts Act 1981, Sch.2, Pt 2.
414