The Ranting Penguin sums it up rather well… “What a tragedy for My Lord Myners, to fall so spectacularly from grace so fucking quickly after his elevation to the peerage so he could serve in Gordon’s Government of the Talent Free” . It would seem that Lord Myners may  not be fit for purpose and according to Sir Tom McKillop, former RBS Chairman, he did know about Fred The Shred’’s massive pension. Conservative MP Michael Fallon, a member of the committee, said that Lord Myners had misled Parliament and should resign. President Obama has arrived in our sceptred isle on Airforce One and two women prattled on for what seemed hours about absolutely nothing as far as I could hear on the BBC’s pointless live coverage. Obama shook hands with Alistair Darling and then jumped on a US helicopter to be transported to the US Ambassador’s residence.  There is no record of whether he asked Chancellor Darling if he knew if  Jacqui Smith’s husband had an orange penis. BBC hyperventilators, it is believed, think not. Chase me, ladies, I’m in the cavalry reports: Fritzl’s Approval Ratings Fall Below Brown’s “The approval ratings of Austrian rapist Josef Fritzl have fallen below Gordon Brown’s according to a Daily Mirror YouGov poll published today which suggests that Brown would win a 20-seat majority at the next election if the Conservative Party were led by Fritzl. Just over 7% of those polled said they were satisfied with the prime minister’s performance, compared to 3% for Fritzl, and 11% for burglars. Brown must hold an election by June 2010 or declare himself Lord Protector.” Douglas Carswell MP does his best to keep the flag fl;ying by writing on his blog: Another reason MPs are resented There’d be much less resentment over MP perks if they were all brilliant at representing the country. Gordon Brown, out of the blue, said: “Stop cash for MP’s second homes’… finally aware, unsually for our prime minister, of mounting public irritation with troughing MPs.   It would seem that we can’t even hold a party at the House without police having to be involved. The Independent reports : “Police used CS spray to break up a scuffle in the Houses of Parliament last night, arresting a man who was a guest at a drinks reception hosted by Conservative Party chairman Eric Pickles.”  The hunt is on from the bloggers and the journos for the ‘miscreants’. And, just to show that we are really on top of things in Britain we are even letting that absurd posturing miniature Frenchman, President Sarkozy,  into the country - even after he said that that ‘Anglo-saxons’ are to blame for Le Crunch-Credit. This may well be true but we don’t need to take any lessons from The Frenchies about anything - well, apart from rugby, perhaps wine making, cooking, film making, literature - and all the good things in life. In the preceding paragraph I am simply following in a fine tradition perfected by Goebbels (See comment on Boris article)  and now used by Boris Johnson to great effect…  of appearing to say one thing, yet saying another….. although Boris does it with rather more style and elan. And finally…before I nip off to see if the Police have started spraying CS gas about or if any protesters have started arriving in tanks - do visit Obnoxio The Clown in the morning with your coffee… today he is direct and to the point with his Send Your MP a couple of photos campaign: “ Print them off, stick them in an envelope and send them to your MP. Maybe the fuckers will get the hint this time.” Oh… and, rather bizarrely, my brother Charon QC has taken to doing imaginary podcasts with Gordon Brown.

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On the eve of G20 Britain leads the world in bizarre politics…

Bullying  (or attempts to bully) is one of the least attractive of human traits, often experienced in the playground sadly, but when seen in adults, and worse, by members of the legal profession -  is a disgrace. Today John Bolch of Family Lore reported on a story published by The Telegraph about allegations made against a barrister.  To cut a long story short, John Bolch repeatedly asked the barrister involved (who had cautioned John Bolch to remove the references to him on Family Lore) to answer a very simple question:  Is it true that allegations are being made against you as reported in The Telegraph? Mr Marc Beaumont of Windsor Chambers   did not wish to waste his time with John Bolch’s perfectly reasonable enquiry (and offer to remove the reference on Family Lore  if it transpired that The Telegraph was mistaken about allegations being made) - and threatened to add John as a party to the ‘future defamation proceedings faced by several parties’ . Enter Geeklawyer - in a beautifully constructed piece of writing… “Memo to idiot barristers: When you are in a hole stop digging…” Geeklawyer makes his views on bullying perfectly clear. Rightly. Read

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Hey ho… hey ho… it’s off to dig we go…

Is it time to call in the Generals? Yesterday, Ian Parker-Joseph joked, following Governor of the Bank of England Mrvyn King’s audience with The Queen (an event without precedent?),  that it would only be a matter of time before The Queen invityed the Generals in. Well… she has done just that.. or rather, Air Chief Marshal Sir Jock Stirrup (Chief of the Defence Staff) has popped over to The Palace for a cuppa… or was it more?  Perhaps to advise about ‘readiness’?  Who knows? Perhaps Her Majesty just wanted an update on The Queen’s Flight or to know if her son ‘Airmiles Andy’ was using any of the aircraft for his important work near foreign golf courses? ? Today - Ian Parker-Joseph, leader of the Libertarian Party UK, reports: “Brown and Mandelson are both out of the country, and the signals are coming thick and fast, they are even re running ‘To play the King’ and ‘House of Cards’ on Sky… The madness that is NuLabour and the European project must be brought to and end, quickly. Could Her Majesty be seriously looking to sack Brown and force an election?” You may think that, Ian - I couldn’t possibly comment…. to borrow a much loved phrase from a particualrly venal, albeit fictional, exemplar of the political species. So, with Dan Hannan MEP ripping into Brown , with Brown being pilloried in polticial blogs and the dead sea press, with The City distinctly unimpressed by the offer to purcahse £1.75 billion of government IOUs yesterday - is it time for change? Is it time for an election? Can The Queen do it? YES, SHE CAN?

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Stick it up your Junta Mr Brown?

I see that my cousin Charon QC  has been busy having a go at His Holiness ( infra ). While I would not wish to provoke yet another schism in the church, especially after that rather embarrassing business over the British holocaust denying bishop ,  it is not particularly helpful to the wider interests of those of us on…shall we say… the financial wing of the church… to have His Holiness calling on our wonderful friends who lead countries in Africa to stop engaging in well established principles of administration and  ‘best practice’ by asking them to stamp out corruption. Selling relics is so 15th century… now we offer a range of services, including Premier Platimum Absolution which covers pretty well every sin from corruption to mass genocide… for a fee, of course. For many years the Church enjoyed power , prestige, influence, great wealth and the private pleasures of the flesh by preying on the superstition and lack of education of the people it sought to have power over.  King Henry VIII started the rot by getting rid of the Pope and grabbing the land and wealth owned by the Church under the wonderful euphemism of ‘Reformation’ and set up a model more convenient to his politico-legal needs to establish a dynasty. Now we share with our brethren in other faiths a world of converts much diminished by education and seek to convert the remaining ill educated peoples of the world to our ways. We have had some success but the internet, the spread of television and people like Hitchens and Dawkins flogging their God Delusion books through Amazon and all good bookshops has made it much more difficult to pass the collection plate around on Sundays - although we are doing good trade in ‘Weddings in Church for the modern godless couple’ , particularly in our more ‘historic’ churches and …. we have upped the stakes by doing wine tastings on Sunday mornings and slipping in a bit of absolution and a complimentary wafer  as our congregation sips the wine. I am often asked if I believe in God.  I smile beningnly, raise my arms to the heavens and say ‘God is within us all’… which usually does the business.   Now, if you forgive me, I have matters to attend to… we are developing a package for governments that are running out of money to pay their police and armed forces.  We have a working title for it… ‘ Operation Put the Fear of God back into your people’. In the name of the  Father… the son…. Cardinal Charoni di Tempranillo

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In the name of the father… the son….

19th March: News and daily news podcast up on Insite Law Major update of news and UK blogs

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19th March: News and daily news podcast up on Insite Law

17th March: News and podcast up on Insite Law

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17th March: News and podcast up on Insite Law

Charon QC Lawcasts Index of Contents The podcasts are all contained on the podcasts page of my new Lawcasts.net website and are also categorised as follows: Master Page | Civil Liberties | Legal Education | The Bar | Solicitors | US & Canadian lawyers | West London Man Satire

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All Charon podcasts now categorised on Lawcasts.net

Legal Week has covered both of my recent podcasts - with Director of LAG, Steve Hynes and with Paul Marsh, President of The Law Society. Legal Week coverage

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The future of the profession after the recession

Lawcast 120: Paul Marsh, President of The Law Society, on the future of the profession after recession. Today I am talking to Paul Marsh, the President of The Law Society of England & Wales. We live in difficult and interesting times. I talk to Paul Marsh about a range of topics including his thoughts on the recession, how the law society is helping solicitors during these difficult days, the recent rise of nearly 10 per cent in fees for the Legal Practice Course by three London providers - BPP, the College of Law and Kaplan - and his thoughts on the future of the profession after the recession. Listen to the podcast Podcast version for iTunes

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Lawcast 120: Paul Marsh, President of The Law Society, on the future of the profession after recession.

Podcasts on The Profession I am starting a series of podcasts on the legal profession this afternoon with an interview with Paul Marsh, President of The Law Society of England & Wales. I plan to discuss: The recession - What The Law Society is doing to assist members - Rise of nearly 10% in LPC fees by  three London providers, BPP, College of Law and Kaplan - The Profession after the recession and Paul Marsh’s thoughts on the role of The Law Society today. Podcasts generally… I am also adding to my series of podcasts on Civil Liberties with a podcast with Steve Hynes, Director of The Legal Action group on access to justice. I’m planning to collate all the podcasts I have done over the past 20 months into categories.  There are 120 podcasts as of today and by categorising them into themes on my new site Lawcats.net I hope this will make the podcasts more accessible for those who want to listen.  This cataloguing will be done over the weekend, if not before.

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Coming soon on Charon blog…