Uncanny how talk of mass deportation, while a regime very visibly attempting to do exactly that across the pond goes violently mad, isn’t a vote winner among the people who’ve chosen to make Britain their home despite being born elsewhere.
The Legal Aid Agency really did not cover themselves in glory in their doomed defence of a bungled refusal of legal aid to a patient seeking to continue successful psilocybin treatment after the end of a clinical trial.
Well yes, but they’ve all seen what you have to do if you win, so maybe that’s why.
When the bench for Ammori (the Palestine Action JR) was enlarged there were noises (including from the Guardian) that it was some sort of stitch up to fix the result for the government. That was obviously rubbish at the time, but is even clearer now that the government have lost!
I’m not attached to any specific solution. Though I’m not sure I agree with the flaw - in this case it probably would help, and even if he were wealthy, it would still defang the financial risk for a confident defendant. County court has benefits, but you do lose the protection of e.g. Steyn J here.
A very good example of why the status quo on defamation is not sustainable from a costs perspective. Maybe anybody issuing a libel claim should have to provide security for costs of the amount required to reach at least the first substantive hearing.
Years ago, when I was a teenager, I heard @marcusbrig.bsky.social on the Now Show say that the best way to resist the temptation to have cocaine for breakfast was not to keep it in the fridge. Good lesson for mechanisms of state oppression too.
Agree wholly. But also - we may have weaker strict constitutional protections, but the reaction to, say, violence by this police (which in America is basically background noise) is much more serious. We investigate things and are horrified by them, and that is another important than (weak) laws.
At uni I did a course on privacy and national security - at the time, it felt largely hypothetical. Clearly bad these capabilities existed, and there discrete (and very bad) cases of misuse, but saying ‘the government could become generally authoritarian and misuse them’ was a seen as bit gauche…
Would he not prefer an Extraordinary Nobel Prize for War given his renaming of the relevant department?
The European Convention on Human Rights was a benefit to British troops, not a burden, writes the Commander Legal for the Iraq War in 2003👇
🔗 www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/5542abd... via @telegraph.co.uk
It was a force for good, ensuring humane treatment and proper accountability.
#ECHR
Right! It serves neither function nor beauty. The simple read is that creating a novel form of human interaction is a very compelling high but is hard to achieve twice.
The things $77bn could have done in that time, instead of failing to create something that would have been socially dire. Even just old fashioned billionaire stuff like libraries, parks, museums. This is what happens when people don’t understand humanity(/humanities).
I booked a pub quiz recently by phone, turned up and the booking was nowhere to be found. Bar staff asked around. Answer: “oh, you spoke to the chef but she was busy making pies and forgot to note your booking”. Never been less annoyed. Maybe the perfect excuse.
This is an appalling judgment to read. Two Chief Constables found in contempt of court for misleading the court about the existence of video footage. But this was only discovered when the matter made it to the Court of Appeal. Incredible perseverance.
www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWC...
They do a lot of inquest JRs involving article 2 (though by no means all), and I’ve often thought it looked in those cases like they thought it would be useful to have a backup judge with paracetamol and a cool damp cloth.
If we want to rebuild the defences against authoritarianism (as we should) we'd be better off using the instruments we already have.
Dismantling Henry VIII powers, getting dirty money out of elections, even changing the electoral system could all be done more easily than writing a new constitution.
This Bill had 8 sponsors: Chris Philp (Shadow Home Secretary), Matt Vickers (shadow home affairs team) as well as Katie Lam (opposition assistant whip) and 5 backbenchers, class of 2024
publications.parliament.uk/pa/bills/cbi...
A civil remedy for wrongful arrest is all well and good but how many people were prevented from protesting by the chilling effect this sort of arrest has?
Quite apart from being banally evil, this is monumentally stupid from Jenrick. England & Wales courts have a deserved global reputation for fairness and expertise which makes them a genuine national asset. Politicising the judiciary in this way will end badly on so many levels.
Great to have @lewisgrahamlaw.bsky.social's take on Hora v UK, the latest instalment in the UK's ongoing saga over prisoner voting, on the UKRHB.
The European Court of Human Rights has ruled, 20 years after the landmark Hirst case, that an applicant prisoner's inability to vote in a UK General Election did not breach the Convention.
Hora v United Kingdom (23 September 2025): hudoc.echr.coe.int?i=001-244851
Some quick thoughts from me:
1/7
Reupping this story as I think it raises an important question:
If the police can stop a protest/action by saying it's "at risk" of breaching traffic laws - there is not a single protest in the country that could not be shut down.
A major free speech issue at stake here.
British NIMBYism is truly a sight to behold.
“We are rejecting this solar farm, because one time I saw an electric vehicle on fire, which reminded me that decades ago a coal mining disaster killed lots of children”.
I expect Glasman would, if his liberty or future security were placed at risk, want and be able to benefit from excellent lawyers. But that is plainly not a position he thinks everyone should be in.
It's also a bit of a grey area on what exactly was wrong, isn't it - the error of law was a failure to take into account plainly relevant considerations. That is less a matter of 'getting the law right' and more a matter or giving the proper thought to the issue to the standard the law requires.
Court made absolutely clear that this was neither a comment on the merits of government policy nor a matter of ECHR law. It's been said so often it is now priced in but it bears repeating: Farage has no desire to base his politics on what is truth. A straight up, obvious, bullshitting liar.
A brief update on the UK Human Rights Blog about the Court of Appeal's decision to overturn the injunction preventing the Bell Hotel from being used to house asylum seekers (and some comment on why it is a good decision!)
Ideology is political. Value is secret second thing.
Informed consent and the temptations of hindsight by Jasper Gold.
Read the full article here: 1corqmlr.com/2025/08/07/i...
#QMLR @jaspergold.bsky.social