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Marshal (COVID) law

22 October 2020 / Nicholas Dobson
Issue: 7907 / Categories: Features
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Nicholas Dobson discusses the Blitz spirit & deploying trained ‘Marshals’ in the fight against COVID-19

In brief

  • While COVID is serious, it isn’t the Blitz.
  • On 8 October 2020 the government issued guidance to encourage local authorities to deploy COVID-19 secure marshals.

‘It’s understandable that in a crisis politicians reach for wartime metaphors—but they don’t always fit.’ So wrote in The Spectator on 22 September 2020 (https://bit.ly/2TkwTtz) former consultant pathologist and pathology professor, Dr John Lee. He was right.

For on 14 March 2020 as COVID-19 (COVID) began to bite, Health Secretary Matt Hancock, wrote in The Telegraph that: ‘Despite the pounding every night, the rationing, the loss of life, [our grandparents] pulled together in one gigantic national effort.’ But today ‘our generation is facing its own test, fighting a very real and new disease’. Everyone will be ‘asked to make sacrifices, to protect themselves and others, especially those most vulnerable to this disease’. Nevertheless, he reassured: ‘With our clear action plan, listening to the advice of the best science,

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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan—Andrew Savage

Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan—Andrew Savage

Firm expands London disputes practice with senior partner hire

Druces—Lisa Cardy

Druces—Lisa Cardy

Senior associate promotion strengthens real estate offering

Charles Russell Speechlys—Robert Lundie Smith

Charles Russell Speechlys—Robert Lundie Smith

Leading patent litigator joins intellectual property team

NEWS
The government’s plan to introduce a Single Professional Services Supervisor could erode vital legal-sector expertise, warns Mark Evans, president of the Law Society of England and Wales, in NLJ this week
Writing in NLJ this week, Jonathan Fisher KC of Red Lion Chambers argues that the ‘failure to prevent’ model of corporate criminal responsibility—covering bribery, tax evasion, and fraud—should be embraced, not resisted
Professor Graham Zellick KC argues in NLJ this week that, despite Buckingham Palace’s statement stripping Andrew Mountbatten Windsor of his styles, titles and honours, he remains legally a duke
Writing in NLJ this week, Sophie Ashcroft and Miranda Joseph of Stevens & Bolton dissect the Privy Council’s landmark ruling in Jardine Strategic Ltd v Oasis Investments II Master Fund Ltd (No 2), which abolishes the long-standing 'shareholder rule'
In NLJ this week, Sailesh Mehta and Theo Burges of Red Lion Chambers examine the government’s first-ever 'Afghan leak' super-injunction—used to block reporting of data exposing Afghans who aided UK forces and over 100 British officials. Unlike celebrity privacy cases, this injunction centred on national security. Its use, the authors argue, signals the rise of a vast new body of national security law spanning civil, criminal, and media domains
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