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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

Bloomsbury Square Employment Law—Donna Clancy

Bloomsbury Square Employment Law—Donna Clancy

Employment law team strengthened with partner appointment

mfg Solicitors—Matt Smith

mfg Solicitors—Matt Smith

Corporate solicitor joins as partner in Birmingham

Freeths—Joe Lythgoe

Freeths—Joe Lythgoe

Corporate director with expertise in creative industries joins mergers and acquisitions team

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Why have private prosecutions surged despite limited data? Niall Hearty of Rahman Ravelli explores their rise in this week's NLJ 
The public law team at Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer surveys significant recent human rights and judicial review rulings in this week's NLJ
In this week's NLJ, Mary Young of Kingsley Napley examines how debarring orders, while attractive to claimants seeking swift resolution, can complicate trials—most notably in fraud cases requiring ‘particularly cogent’ proof
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