Roger Smith

The Daily Mail was keen on Lord Judge’s Judicial Studies Board lecture. It linked his caution on the use of judgments of the Strasbourg European Court of Human Rights to David Cameron’s policies to strengthen British sovereignty. Lord Judge himself, though he uttered the usual judicial disclaimers (“political debate is not for a holder of judicial office”), can hardly have been surprised. He dealt with politically touchy matters—the role of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) and that of the European Court of Justice. On the former, he entered the murky waters of the authority to be accorded by the domestic courts to judgments of the Strasbourg court.

Confusion at the newly created Equality and Human Rights Commission was the last thing that human rights needed.

The General Council of the Bar has publicised the possibility of litigation against the government and the Legal Services Commission.

No less than 12 judges were assembled in the Court of Appeal (five) and the Supreme Court (seven) to deal with the thorny questions raised in R v Horncastle [2009] UKSC 14. You do not get this array of legal talent without a reason.

David Cameron made a fool of himself in his ill-fated attack on “elf and safety”. He got caught out citing as true a “myth” identified on the health and safety executive’s own website. Senior Tories are rallying to his aid to bolster his somewhat similar attack on the Human Rights Act 1998 (HRA 1998).

Let us remember the names of the reviewers and researchers of legal aid since 1997: Sir Peter Middleton, Frontier Economics, Matrix Consultancy, Lord Carter of Coles, the (hapless) in-house Fundamental team and now Sir Ian McGhee. As Labour came into office, it asked a retired banker what to do. As it seemed likely to leave, it asked a former civil servant the same question.

On the very day that the spanking new Supreme Court opened for business, legal tradition reasserted itself. Over the flagstones that had witnessed the trial of Charles I in Westminster Hall walked the elite of the legal world as they made their way to lunch after the traditional service for the opening of the legal year.

Roger Smith looks across the Pond to consider gender & ethnic minorities