Bloody Lawyers – Page 4

There Goes Labour’s ‘No Platform’ Policy

Published on May 6, 2009

New Labour’s just so bloody, bloody inept. Only Gordon Brown could manage to position himself against a wall of swastikas, complete with gurning grin, much to the glee of lobby correspondents and picture editors. You’d think he’d show a little more sensitivity, having literally just paid a visit to Auschwitz.

As if that dreadful image management weren’t enough, now Jacqui Smith’s giving fascists the oxygen of publicity too, having banned Fox-sanctioned eliminationist rabble rouser and ‘shock-jock’ Michael Savage from Britain:

Ms Smith said she decided to make public the names of 16 people banned since October so others could better understand what sort of behaviour Britain was not prepared to tolerate.

She told BBC Breakfast that Mr Savage was “someone who has fallen into the category of fomenting hatred, of such extreme views and expressing them in such a way that it is actually likely to cause inter-community tension or even violence if that person were allowed into the country”.

But Mr Savage, real name Michael Weiner, insisted he has never advocated violence.

No, but he’s certainly adept at deliberately winding up those who do, in between churning out crappy books on nutrition. Sorry Savage, no 1st Amendment here.

He’s suing Jackie Smith for libel, for damaging his reputation. Good luck with that…

A libel in England is defined as “….any published statement(s) which are alleged to defame a named or identifiable individual or individuals in a manner which causes them loss in their trade or profession, or causes a reasonable person to think worse of him, her or them”

I’m a reasonable person and his banning couldn’t possibly make me think worse of Savage.

Savage’s all over the airwaves saying he’s got seven (or was it nine, or twenty-three) lawyers on the case. Seems to me the Home Secretary actually has a legal leg to stand on, for once: given Savage’s inflammatory statements and status as a public figure, a banning appears to be nothing but fair comment and besides, truth is always an absolute defence.

I hope he does sue, I can’t wait for the show. But then again maybe not: he’s desperate for ratings since times have changed, his audince is dwindling and he’s losing advertisers. Smith and New Labour, in their typically inept way have given Savage exactly what he needs. So much for ‘no platform.’

Injustice Is Built In

Published on April 20, 2009

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You wouldn’t have seen it in New Labour’s 1997 manifesto, though.

Labour’s deliberate policy of shutting down legal channels to justice for the average Joe and Josephine in order to crush dissent, this from an adminstration of lawyers, is something I’ve been blogging about for a long time.

I was idly rereading the ‘police’ post archive this morning in light of the G20 police brutality reports when I was reminded of this 2000 Schnews article, which made me wonder: how many of those peaceful protestors arrested at Kingsnorth or Nottingham or the G20 or Plymouth or on misapplied terrorist legislation have had, or can get access to legal advice?

Not too many, I’d wager:

Sweeping changes to the legal aid system are going to mean that thousands who find themselves dragged into the legal system are going to find themselves without proper legal advice. Despite the fact that this government has created 6,000 new criminal offences in the last ten years, and is hauling record numbers before the courts and off to chokey, they’re now keen to restrict access to legal advice. All in the name of cost-cutting and reducing inefficiency of course. What is actually happening is a massive erosion of hard won rights and the end of the legal aid system, which helped achieve some degree of parity in court cases. (OK, so SchNEWS is obviously against the system, man, but meantime still not keen to see what few civil liberties we have taken away!)

The changes came in on January 14th. Prior to this, on arrival at the police station you would be offered contact with a solicitor of your choice. From now on you will be directed to the Criminal Defence Call Centre (CDCC). This is staffed, not by solicitors but by accredited representatives who’ve done a training course, many of them actually ex-coppers. You will only be allowed to contact your own solicitor if you pay privately. Needless to say the call centre advice is probably going to be different to that of a specialist defence solicitor.

While I have met at least one accredited representative who was an ex-copper and did a fantastic job, to put so many of them (they’re cheaper than actual lawyers) in charge of dispensing legal advice to the arrested might lead one to think the government’s given the police control of the independent legal process – though no doubt Jack Straw would deny that to his dying breath.

One Brighton-based solicitor told SchNEWS, “Previously we could intervene in the process earlier – warn people to make no comment, not to sign police notebooks and not to answer any questions off the PNC1 form*. We could act as an outside guarantee of people’s rights while they were inside. Now, the system is in meltdown. If the call centre is too incompetent to get hold of your brief then you may end up using a duty solicitor or remaining unrepresented. If you’re not going to be interviewed then you can be fingerprinted, DNAed and booted out of the door without once receiving any independent advice.”

While there was never a Legal Aid golden age Labour’s deliberate blocking of justice and dismantling of low cost legal advice networks and legal aid over the past 12 years has created a legal advice desert. So far it’s only been affecting those nasty, nasty druggies, petty crims, burglars and crusty anarchists, so there’s been little outcry about it from the bourgeoisie. They’re criminals, who cares?

But if there’s no justice for criminals, there’s no justice for anyone. As I wrote at the time:

Should citizens, empowered by knowing what their rights are and how to enforce them, start to challenge the boss, who knows where it might lead?

The overthrow of New Labour – and that would never do.

Why, such an informed populace might start enforcing their rights on other things too. They might even start to challenge the everyday petty tyrannies of Labourâ€™s incompetent and authoritarian government, like, say, the deaths of children in custody or the illegal invasions of other sovereign nations or the selective imposition of swingeing terrorist legislation on people of a certain ethnicity and/or religion.

Maybe now a few of the comfortable middles at legitimate protests like the G20 have had theirs or their kids’ heads batoned, been kettled by aggressive paramilitaries or arrested on trumped up ‘terrorism’ charges for merely expressing their right to free speech, we’ll see a bit more outrage and a lot more challenge.

Hindsight Is Overrated

Published on April 17, 2009

Belatedly, a former UK Director of Public Prosecutions asks the essential questions about the police’s behaviour at the G20 protests:

…here are some questions for the IPCC to consider as it investigates the events leading to Ian Tomlinson’s death: why were British police officers attending a demonstration in the heart of London with their identifying numbers hidden? In the absence of a fire risk, who authorised them to pull balaclavas up over their heads? And why didn’t they want anyone to see their faces?

Yes why? Were they “Only following orders….”? Presumably the police at Mark Saunders shooting were following orders to cover their faces; otherwise that’s a lot of bad apples in the police.

The DPP is responsible for determining any charges and prosecuting criminal cases investigated by the police in England and Wales; he or she makes decisions about the most complex and sensitive cases and advises the police on criminal matters. He reports to the Attorney General, the Government minister who answers for the Crown Prosecution Service in Parliament.

How come it was that the politically-appointed former DPP from 2003 to 2008, MCDonald, a QC and former (and again post-retirement) member of human rights chambers Matrix (colleague Cherie Blair), couldn’t bring himself to ask those questions when he could have had some effect?

It’s much easier to write a condemnatory Guardian editorial after the fact – and presumably pocket a fee – than to act against the police when you have the power to.

Just Keep Spinning

Published on April 16, 2009

CPS declares there’s no evidence to sufficient to prosecute Damien Green or his source and the opposition MP’s arrest by the antiterrorism police aka the Keystone Kops is shown to have been politically motivated.

Meanwhile as far away as possible from Westminster in Scotland, Gordon Brown finally says sorry for Smeargate.

The media’s consequently in a bit of a quandary as which story to give top billing.

What a coincidence that the two events should happen on the same day and at the same time, just in time for the 1 o’clock news.

Could they by any chance be related?

Update

I think he may feeling the pressure. Quote:

Gordon Brown: “I take full responsibility for what happens and that’s why the person who was responsible went immediately.”

WTF? Gordon’s resigned now?

Is Google Streetview NL In Breach of EU Data Protection Law?

Published on March 20, 2009

Streetview may be winning in court in the US, but they may find the legal going a bit stickier in the EU.

The furore in the British press this morning about the advent of Google Streetview in UK and NL echoes that of its US launch, when Google Streetview, which allows the casual browser to wander at will virtually peeking in windows, gardens and doors, or wherever else Google’s camera poked its invasive lens, faced legal challenges on breach of privacy grounds.

So far Google’s defeated its legal challengers – but will EU data protection laws defeat Google?

Streetview’s just been launched here in NL too, and lo and behold! There’s our house: and our bedroom window, which you can look right into. And our front door, with our names on it.

That’s because it’s obligatory when you move into a property here to register your residence with the local authority, the gemeente. They then give you or you buy an embossed nameplate (see above), which you put on your front door, usually above the letterbox or by the doorbell. (Makes it easier to round you up – the Arena bomb hoaxers arrested up the street the other day had their names on the letterbox too).

This means that what Google Streeetview has done, in effect, is to compile a visual database of the names and addresses of every resident in the Netherlands save those paranoids – or the sensible, your choice – who haven’t complied with the local gemeente‘s pettifogging door-labelling rules.

Did Google or its licensers in government ever consider that, because it’s possible to zoom in on this database and that therefore it’s accessible to any casual viewer, they are potentially in breach of EU data protection laws – specifically Directive 95/46/EC on the protection of personal data?

Google claims it owns all Streetview data. Streetview NL is a database, although it’s visual. Surely any database containing individuals’ names and addresses should be subject to EU data protection regs? I’d certainly contend it should*.

Any EU member government body that allows or licenses Google to compile such a database might also be in breach of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights which guarantees the privacy of individuals and families; broadly, it covers “private and family life, .. home and correspondence”, subject to certain restrictions that are “in accordance with law” and “necessary in a democratic society” .

I’m no expert on EU data protection laws and their application in NL – *I am no longer a lawyer – but that jumped right out at me.

Why didn’t it jump out to any of Google’s high-priced advocaten?

UPDATE

Heh.

When interviewed, a Google Streetview driver/photographer demanded he not be photographed.