net benefit which yields the highest value. Having identified this effect, the
legislature then determines which statute causes this effect. This is the statute
which a rational legislature will enact. Consequently, the legislature enacts this
statute.
Interpreting Statute Law
Introduction
Policy is deployed in the task of choosing between the options before a court
when the court is interpreting law. To explain this fully, we will proceed as we
did with statutes through the three steps in the policy model.
Step 1: Options
Step 1 identifies the options before the court. These consist of the meanings
of the ambiguous provision
and the effect that each meaning would cause if
chosen by the court as the correct legal meaning. They can be set out in a table
in the following way:
Meanings
Effects
Meaning 1
Effect 1
Meaning 2
Effect 2
Meaning n
Effect n
Figure 12.3 Meanings and Effects
This table illustrates and emphasises that to identify fully the two options, a
court has to predict the effect that each meaning will cause. Thus in the table
Meanings 1-n cause Effects 1-n such that Meaning 1 produces Effect 1,
Meaning 2 produces Effect 2, and Meaning n produces Effect n.
Obviously a court’s prediction as to the effect of a meaning is not necessarily
correct. We cannot know for certain the effect that any meaning will produce.
We can only make a reasoned guess or prediction. This means that there can
be, and will be, argument in the community, in the legislature, in court and
among scholars, as to the likely effect of a particular interpretation. (And even
after a meaning is chosen it is not always possible to work out the effect that it
has caused, or to work it out precisely or with confidence.)
Step 2: Reasons
While the logic is clear that a court should interpret law by reference to policy,
two questions arise. (1) Determining the Policy. A court must first determine
the policy it will use because there are several competing versions of legislative
policy. When the court has made its choice it then uses or applies this policy
to interpret the law. (2) Applying the Policy. When a court seeks to apply a
policy it potentially has two options because a policy possesses two
components, namely meanings and effects. This means that a court can
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