Liadnan

For the love of Christ... If at first you fuck it up, have another go. And another. Repeat for the duration of your 9 years in office and claim you're successfully implementing policies.

Mr Reid said he wanted [...] to "move away from the traditional view that justice has to involve going to court [...]. The problem we face is what I call the justice shortfall. That is, the difference - sometimes big - between what you and I think is justice, and what a lawyer or legal academic might think it is. My kind of justice is swift, effective and matches the crime," said the home secretary."

The problem is, Reid appears to have no conception at all of the notion that those accused of crime, or wrongdoing in general, might be innocent, or even that there might, just possibly, be another side to the story. Accused=Guilty=Deserving of Punishment. Look at what a brilliant success ASBOs are. (Incidentally, I've seen more than one neighbour dispute where people have gone off and obtained ASBOs on no real grounds at all, simply for the asking, as a weapon in the usual war of attrition. Somehow, getting rid of them is more difficult, however ludicrous they may be.) As for lawyers, particularly criminal litigators, well, what the hell do they know. They all sit in ivory towers all day, not as though they go to a court and hear the nuts and bolts of criminal cases, the nasty little realities and allegations that all this is based on, the evidence about what was done by whom, day in day out.... um. (I actually do sit in an ivory tower a small basement office most of my days, but then I don't practice criminal law, preferring to be paid more than a pittance, that, by the standards of most people educated to degree level, being what junior criminal practitioners receive, contrary to popular belief). For the same reason he's returning to the idea of capping compensation for those wrongly accused: apparently "it is unfair that they in some cases get paid more than people who are victims of crime". But what do the wrongs of the two groups have to do with one another? It's a complete non-sequitur. Unless, of course, they were guilty all along and only got off "on a technicality". Ah those pesky technicalities. You'd think, if there wasn't a good substantive reason for them they wouldn't be there.

Ah fuck off you fascist thug.

EConvHR: Article 6 – Right to a fair trial

1 In the determination of his civil rights and obligations or of any criminal charge against him, everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable time by an independent and impartial tribunal established by law. Judgment shall be pronounced publicly but the press and public may be excluded from all or part of the trial in the interests of morals, public order or national security in a democratic society, where the interests of juveniles or the protection of the private life of the parties so require, or to the extent strictly necessary in the opinion of the court in special circumstances where publicity would prejudice the interests of justice.

2 Everyone charged with a criminal offence shall be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law.

3 Everyone charged with a criminal offence has the following minimum rights:
a to be informed promptly, in a language which he understands and in detail, of the nature and cause of the accusation against him;
b to have adequate time and facilities for the preparation of his defence; (etc.)

(Those like Mr Cameron who prefer this stuff to be British (whatever that means) can go read a little bit about the history of civil liberties and the conceptual foundations of the ECHR -quite heavily influenced by Anglo-American concepts, in sharp contrast to the EU treaties-, before saying anything stupid themselves.)

But the protest has had its critics, with Tory London Assembly member Brian Coleman calling them "sad, mad and bad".

"Is this really the image we want to give of London - tourists whose income we rely on for the jobs and prosperity of our city?"'

"Bugger civil liberties, think of the tourist trade?" And in what universe would the tourist trade be adversely affected?

What a tedious cock.

"It's not a matter of free speech - it's a matter of a proper way of running a world city."

Wrong.

Intriguing article in El Reg picking up on a story in the Observer that people around Gordon Brown are seriously floating what has been thought of as the paranoid nightmare of ID cards: ultimate function creep whereby every electronic transaction in the UK would be linked to ID - and thence to loyalty card schemes.

With any luck this will be what kills the whole idea.

Though the Court of Appeal have now held that despite the appallingly shoddy drafting of the legislation preventing unauthorised protests in Parliament Square, the section does indeed apply to Brian Haw, for the moment he remains (unless things have developed further since last night's raid).

The response from the Police and Government seems pretty ridiculously pathetic - see here for last night's antics.

Judgment has come down from the Lords in the Begum case: whether it is a disportionate interference with the right to freedom of religion for a state school to ban wearing the jilbab (though not less extreme forms of Islamic dress)

( from the judgment )

I have a vague personal interest in the case in that one of the junior counsel being led by Ms Cherie Booth QC for the applicant throughout the case was a friend at Corpus: one of the most brilliant people I have ever met.

In a repeat performance of their judgment in A v. Home Secretary of last year, which I remember cheering at the time, the Lords have now ruled (in the same case) that that evidence procured by torture is inadmissable in the courts of this country. Praise be.

Interesting and possibly quite important divide between Bingham, Nicholls and Hoffman on the one side (the right one in my view) and the majority on the other on where the burden lies when considering whether information was acquired by torture though. ( Read more... )

Incidentally, I think it's clear from the judgments that should the point arise the Lords will be singularly unimpressed with the narrow definition of torture which the CIA appear to be using, see eg para 53.

"The argument that there is no power to enforce the law by injunction or contempt proceedings against a minister in his official capacity would, if upheld, establish the proposition that the executive obey the law as a matter of grace and not as a matter of necessity, a proposition which would reverse the result of the Civil War."

(per Lord Templeman in M v. Home Office [1994] AC 377).

And see a variety of other cases going back to the run of "no you can't get any money that way either Charlie" cases that, along with a few other bits and pieces, eventually brought down Charles I's personal rule, forced him to summon first the Short Parliament and then the Long Parliament, and finally precipitated the Civil War.

Civil Contingencies Act 2004

Be it enacted by the Queen’s most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:— [...]

s.20
Power to make emergency regulations
(1) Her Majesty may by Order in Council make emergency regulations if satisfied that the conditions in section 21 are satisfied.
(2) A senior Minister of the Crown may make emergency regulations if satisfied—
(a) that the conditions in section 21 are satisfied, and
(b) that it would not be possible, without serious delay, to arrange for an Order in Council under subsection (1).
(3) In this Part “senior Minister of the Crown” means—
(a) the First Lord of the Treasury (the Prime Minister),
(b) any of Her Majesty’s Principal Secretaries of State, and
(c) the Commissioners of Her Majesty’s Treasury.

[...]

s.22
[...]
(3) Emergency regulations may make provision of any kind that could be made by Act of Parliament or by the exercise of the Royal Prerogative[*].

(Quoted from Bills Before Parliament as although the Bill passed it has not yet made it onto Public Acts of the UK Parliament 2004. The form of the Act as passed may differ in some details from this, though the substance remains, I believe, the same.) (Edited to add now here.)

Yes, it's fair to point out that the executive of 2004, unlike that of 1642, does itself have a degree of democratic legitimacy. It should also be conceded that the Civil Contingencies Act contains many limitations on itself.

I am, nonetheless, far from convinced that these are sufficient.

(*ie about anything at all)

Edited to add: oh and the double "satisfied" in ss.20(1) and 20(2)(a), while comprehensible, is bloody awful stylistically.