26th May: News, law reports, latest from the blogs – up on Insite Law

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26th May: News, law reports, latest from the blogs – up on Insite Law

Blawg Review #213 – Towel edition… is up at Cyber Law Central – it is fun and you also get to see quite a few well known bloggers from the States, including the mysterious ED of Blawg Review (and bloggers from other parts of the universe) – go and take a look… but, you’ll need to take your towel with you.

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Blawg Review #213

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In the beginning… man created God…

It is Towel Day on Monday 25th in memory of Douglas Adams and his timeless classic Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy .  I met him briefly in the early eighties – his wife, Jane, was a good friend of mine – a barrister and a very good law teacher.  So… I have no difficulty at all in supporting this worthy memorial.  CyberLaw Central is hosting Blawg Review on that day – and it will, I am sure, be a good one! If you are a blogger - get your pics with towels over to CyberLaw Central .  If you aren’t a blogger but would like to send me your towel pic… I’ll put them up on my blog for the edification of the known universe.   I do apologise for my pic – I had had a few the night before and ‘just out of the shower’ is not one of my best angles. This is why I do AUDIO podcasts and not vids. Email pics to me?

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Towel Day in memory of Douglas Adams

News, law reports and comment up on Insite Law. I am particularly interested in hearing from practitioners, academics and students on the issues raised in Two Tribes go to War below.  Please add your thoughts if you have time / inclination.

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22nd May: Insite Law news up

Tory grandee Sir Peter Viggers forced to quit over £30,000 gardening bill Times: The purge of Conservative MPs caught up in the expenses scandal intensified last night as David Cameron forced out a grandee who had claimed £30,000 for gardening. Off with their heads? As Gordon dithers while Westminster burns, rejects Cameron’s calls for an immediate election and admits that a conservative government being elected at a snap election would cause chaos Richard Gordon, QC, writing in the Times states – “Thinking the unthinkable is what constitutional lawyers are paid to do. Many are now saying that with the daily revelations about improper expenses claims from beleaguered MPs the Queen should step in and dissolve Parliament — against the Government’s wishes — forcing a general election to compel MPs to stand for immediate re-election after a scandal on the scale of that of the pre 1832 rotten boroughs. Trust has now been destroyed. It can, so the argument runs, be rebuilt only by a neutral third party, the Queen, and not by a self-interested and wholly discredited cabal of politicians. ” I suspect that an immediate election would do more harm than good at present and The Queen would be best advised to keep well out of this sorry mess. The prospect of an immediate election at a time when we are in the midst of a serious financial situation is not one that appeals greatly – a view quite possibly shared by many who sit back and reflect on the wider picture. While The Queen may have constitutional prerogatives to dissolve Parliament, in the event that she stays her hand, the timing of the next election will be at the discretion of Gordon Brown – assuming, of course, that the Labour Party men in togas, knives hidden within the folds of cloth, do not call upon the prime minister late of an evening shortly. Far more interesting is the nature and scale of the cull of MPs coming. Tory grandees are dropping like flies. Hogg, Steen and now Sir ePter ‘Donald Duck’ Viggers are standing down… what will Gordon Brown’s Star Chamber do. Hazel Blears, we are told by the PM, has behaved unacceptably. Unacceptably enough to be removed? There are others, at a senior level within the Labour Party who should be considering their position. They may also have to look at their shoulders frequently to see if their collars are being felt by PC Plod. Jonathan Fisher, QC , in a most interesting article in The Time today writes: ” A police investigation into the MPs expenses scandal will swiftly identify false accounting as the criminal offence most likely to have been committed by the most egregious of the SW1 claimants. ” Bar Boy , commenting on my blog yesterday wrote: “Do any of you grown up lawyer experts have a view over those of our esteemed parliamantarian troughers who also happen to be barristers, such as Hogg, Straw and Hoon. No one, to my knowledge, has yet commented on this aspect. The Bar is very insistent, to the point of being annoyingly repetitive, when banging on about standards and conduct, blah, blah, yawn etc. Should, for example, Inner, now be making an example of governing bencher Straw, and passing him the pearl handled revolver ? ” He has a point. I may be making a telephone call to the Bar Council this morning and make yet another nuisance of myself. *** Insite Law Magazine has been updated – major update of news, blogs, law reports – and I have a new Best Seller books *Carousel*. In the spirit of our times, so I stay within the rules and I am transparent, I disclose a personal interest in what follows…. So if you want to buy your books for the beach etc – buy them through me and you will laze on the beach secure in the knowledge that the derisory commission offered by Amazon of 5% will go straight into my Rioja acccount and this may give you a warm glow.  It will certainly give me one! To be honest… I am not bothered about the commission… I just liked the Bestseller carousel widget… I am into widgets. Have a look and see what is selling well at the moment in the bookshops and on Amazon!

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He’s Ducked!…

The end of the beginning… the beginning of the end? The Speaker has gone.. Long live The Speaker. Michael Martin stepped down before the Cleggian ‘Death by a thousand cuts’ in a selfless act of self immolation to unite Parliament. With his departure the MPs are now speculating on who will be the next Speaker and will drag the new Speaker to the Chair on or shortly after 22 June. Finkelstein, however, wants to ban MPs from betting on this. History was made yesterday – but will Parliament take the opportunity to change, to reform? Michael Brown MP writes: “Future A-level history students will be answering questions not only about the Long Parliament and the Rump Parliament, but also about the “Moat” Parliament (otherwise perhaps known as the “Manure” Parliament) presided over by Speaker Martin – the first Speaker to be forcibly removed from office in 300 years.” Andrew Grice, also of The Independent suggests that the Westminister Gentleman’s Club is dead and the power of the men in tights is coming to ane end. The Leaders of all the principal parties will now move to discipline members who have broken the rules. Is this the return of the Star Chamber ? Not literally, of course – but the Conservative ‘Scrutiny’ committee and Brown’s.. ‘whatever it gets to be called Tribunal’ will, surely, have to pass judgment on those who have erred? One small difficulty that Brown faces, of course, is that his own Chief Whip has a bit of a problem with food expense claims running at £21 a day for some years (£18,000 in total) according to some reports. the Whip’s Office is, of course, responsible for internal discipline. Will we see the departure of leading ministers? Hoon and Blears, for example? The Justice Minister who resigned last week may well be among those put to the Sword. The Speaker has gone and will be replaced. This is only the end of the beginning. What follows now – and quickly – may shape our democracy perhaps more even than the now largely irrelevant Magna Carta. *** Major update on Insite Law Geeklawyer on ‘This filth thinks he is above the law’ |  Other blog posts noted | All the most impportant law news | Profession update | law reports… and more…

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The end of the beginning… the beginning of the end?

News and updates to law reports, profession and blogs is up on Insite Law Is there a danger that democracy is being undermined? Over the past week or so, The Telegraph has drip fed revelation after revelation about MP expense excesses; whipping up a frenzy of public ridicule and even a degree of hatred for those who have most abused the system. Bloggers, including myself, have had a bit of sport and that is fair enough – but there are dangers that democracy is being undermined by this fiasco and, certainly, the pressure on the PM, ministers and members of parliament, is such that one wonders whether the business of actually running the country, running the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan et al , is suffering. Guido Fawkes has suggested that people can punish MPs in the forthcoming elections by voting for fringe parties; suggesting the Green Party, Libertas and UKIP as possible alternatives. I do not know if he is being serious, or care that much. I’m certainly not going to vote for these parties simply because I am not persuaded by their ability to run the country any better than the present crew. For my part, the leaders of the three principal parties have to sort the mess out and put their houses and the House in order. Last night I talked to Tom Harris MP, the Labour MP for Glasgow South, who gave direct and thoughtful answers to my questions about the expenses issue, The Speaker’s position, whether we will get an early general election – as David Cameron has called for and the ‘public’ (whoever they are) have called for. The podcast is 20 minutes long and if you have the time and inclination it is worth listening to . One thing is certain – and MPs are falling over themselves to apologise and agree – change must come; but we must have in place a system of sensible, realistic and adequate remuneration and reimbursement for expenses wholly, necessarily and exclusively related to the important work MPs do if we are to have a viable Government and Opposition made up of men and women with the intellect, the experience and the spirit to run the country on our behalf. The Metropolitan Police Commissioner has stated that he is prepared to investigate cases of wrongdoing and it may be, in time, that those who have broken the rules with outright fraud, as opposed to a misinterpretation of what appears to have been a rulebook based on what Tom Harris calls a ‘culture of entitlement’, will be held to account. We shall see. Do listen to the podcast with Tom Harris MP (Below), whatever your political persuasion, if you have the time – he makes some good and measured points Editor pick of the day 19th May 2009 Head of Legal : The Speaker – wholly inadequate Geeklawyer: Geeklawyer speaks: The Speaker must go “… it looks as though an ex-SAS hero may have been crucial as an intermediary in spilling the beans on the expenses horror.” Editor Mike SP Email On this day… 19th May 1536 – Anne Boleyn , the second wife of Henry VIII of England , is beheaded for adultery , treason , and incest . 1649 – An Act declaring England a Commonwealth is passed by the Long Parliament . England would be a republic for the next eleven years 1568 – Queen Elizabeth I of England has Mary Queen of Scots arrested.

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Is there a danger that democracy is being undermined?

Lawcast 136: Tom Harris MP Today I am talking to Tom Harris MP, the Labour member for Glasgow South , an enthusiastic user of twitter and author of his own very active blog A ND ANOTHER THING . Tom has also taken to podcasting himself in recent weeks with Jamie Read MP under the title Two men and a Pod – and most enjoyable they are too. It is impossible for me to interview a well known MP and not mention the elephant in the room – the subject of MP expenses, the title of a podcast done by Tom and Jamie Read towards the tail end of last week. As far as I know, Tom Harris doesn’t have a moat and if he did, it is unlikely he would have claimed for it. Content: MP Expenses – the way forward | The position of The Speaker in the present crisis |Do we need an election now and who is going to win? | Blogging, Twitter and Dr Who. Listen to the podcast *** Podcast version for iTunes

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Lawcast 136: Tom Harris MP

Forgive the truly appalling pun – but I have just had a glass of Rioja with a breakfast of bacon, egg, beans, brown toast (naturally)..  It is my official birthday today and I intend to have a mildly surreal day. Laters… I am orf to do some Smokedo on the rowing mnachine and then.. who knows…

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A Parliament of crooks…