By RAYMOND KONGWA, Guardian Senior Reporter

raymond@nasguard.com

While affirming the Privy Council Judicial Committee's privilege in serving as the country's court of final appeal, a Senior Law Lord stressed yesterday that the government and people of The Bahamas had a right to replace the body. Lord Bingham of Cornhill made the remarks while speaking in the Court of Appeal during the opening ceremony for the Judicial Committee's first ever working visit outside the city of London.

"If a time should come when the government and people of The Bahamas feel that their interest would be better served, or if there was no such right, or if the right of appeal was applied to a body other than the Privy Council, then it would be open to the government and the people, by taking the appropriate constitutional steps, to give effect to those wishes," said Lord Bingham. "That is your right as an independent state. No one could stop you and no one would wish to do so."

Noting that it was his personal opinion that no government could bind its successor, Lord Bingham added: "I cannot conceive that any British government would itself abolish the role of the Privy Council as the final court of appeal for the Commonwealth of The Bahamas so long as the Bahamian government and people want that role to continue. "As it is, the members of the Privy Council feel greatly privileged to serve the people of these islands. It's a role which we cherish and would not, for our part, abandon. The discussions on the future must rest with you and not with us."

That the country's court of final appeal was sitting in Nassau was in one sense unremarkable said Lord Bingham. But he added that the sitting was remarkable in another sense as the Judicial Committee had functioned for 170 years in virtually the same form and had not sat outside of London before yesterday.

In Attorney General Allyson Maynard-Gibson's opinion: "The fact that litigants before our courts are able to have final appellant access to the Privy Council undergirds the confidence that has been displayed nationally and internationally in our country. It is my humble submission that the Privy Council's role in the Commonwealth of The Bahamas has a significant positive impact on our judicial system," she added. Having the Privy Council Judicial Committee as the court of final appeal was also of benefit to the country "in that judges in Privy Council are the senior and most experienced judges in the United Kingdom [and] are likely to have participated in or even offered the very judgments being cited and followed by our Bahamian courts."

She said that the Law Lords were likely to have heard "similar points of thought" from other Commonwealth cases and therefore provided Bahamian matters with a "unique and profound perspective." "The Privy Council has set a standard for judicial excellence, which has given confidence, stability and reliance in the rule of law as operated in the many countries of the British Commonwealth, whose highest court of appeal has been that of your Lordship's Judicial Committee and your distinguished predecessors," said former Governor General Sir Orville Turnquest while welcoming the Law Lords on behalf of The Bahamas' Inner Bar.

Praising the Judicial committee for having moved to post its judgments on the World Wide Web, while welcoming the Law Lords on the Outer Bar's behalf, Bahamas Bar Council President Wayne Munroe said: "This visit serves further to demystify for us, and we would like to think for you, some of the administration of justice for the Commonwealth of The Bahamas, insofar as you, My Lords, would have seen New Providence and Nassau."

Revealing that Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II had conveyed greetings and best wishes to all involved in " this historic occasion," Lord Bingham said: "The warmth of our welcome has been such that we are already very reluctant to sit anywhere outside of the Commonwealth of the Bahamas."