Labour MP Jose' Herrera has expressed fears that members of the judiciary who are nearing retirement may act in a particular way vis-à-vis the government in order to be given a senior appointment to supplement their "miserable" pension.

Saying this was his personal opinion, Dr Herrera said in an adjournment speech in Parliament that it had become the practice that whenever a public inquiry was ordered, a retired judge or magistrate was appointed to head it. It had also become customary that when judges and magistrates retired, they were given the chairmanship of a committee, commission or inquiry board.

Nothing was wrong with this, as the government was thus making the best use of experienced people. But was it ideal that as judges and magistrates approached retirement age with a pension of less than Lm300 per month, it might suit them to act in a certain way in order to be handed a chairmanship?

In the early 1970s, the Nationalists used to argue that a judge should not be able to become President so that he would not have any inclination to favour the government in the hope of such a nomination. It was the wrong argument, because, by the same yardstick, a magistrate could not become a judge, and so on, Dr Herrera said.

But now one had a situation where judges who were approaching retirement might be tempted to make their own calculations so that when they stepped down, they could occupy a senior post in order to make up for their low pension.

This possibility could undermine the independence of the judiciary, he warned.

"To have the members of the judiciary dependent for their living on a possible future nomination is totally wrong."

Dr Herrera said he had spoken to judges and magistrates who were nearing retirement age and the current situation was worrying them. The members of the judiciary were used to a certain standard of living. Yet upon retirement they would have a miserable pension.

"Having such a low pension may pose a challenge to the independence of the judiciary. Judges have been put in a position where, as they approach pensionable age, they have to cosy up to the government or be sufficiently cautious to ensure that upon retirement, they are given a new position, or else they will starve."

Dr Herrera said the government had a choice, either to raise the retirement age of the judiciary or to raise their pensions. In the UK, judges retired at 75, in Italy at 70, at Strasbourg, at 70, at the European Court at 75, and in the US they never retired.

Indeed, it was a shame that a number of respected judges and magistrates would have to retire within a few months and one should consider a constitutional amendment to raise the pensionable age of judges and magistrates. His personal view was that judges should retire at 70, instead of 61 as at present, and magistrates at 65 and not at 60.

Dr Herrera said that is was also wrong that whenever a public inquiry was needed, the task was not assigned to the duty magistrate and the government, perhaps because the duty magistrate was not to its liking, picked a member of the judiciary for the purpose. Thus the inquiring magistrate was selected by the minister who had a direct interest in the outcome of the inquiry.

It was not good enough for the government to blame the backlog before the magistrates.

Nor could the government blame the magistrates, since it was the government that appointed them.

It now appeared that the government, for ulterior motives, was planning radical amendments to reduce the powers of magistrates in inquiries.

It appeared that inquiries carried out independently were not to the government's liking and the government was using the shortcoming of some particular magistrate to mount a general attack on the magistrates and the judiciary, claiming that the current system of magisterial inquiries was not working.

The system, Dr Herrera said, was not functioning well because of the way the government selected certain people, for political reasons.

One should consider appointing a panel of people, or a judicial House committee to scrutinise nominations to the judiciary so that there could be greater transparency.

In 1996, the Labour government had made serious proposals on how inquiries should be conducted autonomously by magistrates, but the government had not followed them up.