18 February 2019
From the popular four part episodes out of 1 Crown Office Row’s seminar ‘Erasure, Remediation and Rights of Appeal in Disciplinary Proceedings’, we bring you Episode 67 with Matthew Barnes, who asks the question in his talk about remediation – Can you teach an old dog new tricks?
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18 February 2019
MAS Group Holdings Ltd and others, R (on the application of) v Barco De Vapor B.V. and others [2019] EWHC 158 (Admin), 4 February 2019
As a matter of policy, the UK government is committed to improving the welfare of all animals, or so we are given to understand. In this little-covered ruling, we see that the responsible authorities are trying to do what they can to alleviate the suffering of farm animals enduring transport for slaughter:
[The government] would prefer to see animals slaughtered as near as possible to their point of production and thus trade in meat is preferable to a trade based on the transport of live animals. Whilst it recognises the United Kingdom’s responsibilities whilst remaining a member of the EU, it will be looking to take early steps to control the export of live animals for slaughter as the UK moves towards a new relationship with Europe.
Livestock transport has been a controversial subject in the UK for many years. Efforts by public authorities to reduce or mitigate the movement or export of live animals have hitherto foundered on the rocks of free movement of goods (see my post on TFEU Article 35). Despite the ethical controversy, the current position is that long distance transport of nonhuman animals for slaughter is lawful (Barco de Vapor BV v Thanet District Council [2015] Bus LR 593.)
4 February 2019
Following our popular interview with James Badenoch QC on the “doctor knows best” rule of evidence in medical negligence cases, we bring you John Whitting QC, healthcare law specialist at 1 Crown Office Row (@JohnWhittingQC). In Episode 64 of Law Pod UK, John talks to Rosalind English about the realities of clinical encounters and considers to what extent patients are willing, or in some circumstances even able – to take on board multiple options for their treatment.
28 January 2019
In July 2018 Noel Conway, who suffers from motor neurone disease, lost his claim for a declaration that the UK’s ban on assisted suicide was a disproportionate and unnecessary interference with his right to autonomy under Article 8. The Supreme Court refused to hear his appeal.
27 January 2019
ECLI:NL:RBAMS: 2018:8606, Rechtbank Amsterdam, C/13/636885 / HA RK 17-301 – read judgment
An Amsterdam court has ruled that Google should bring down an unofficial “blacklist” of doctors maintained by a discussion group on the internet. This is said to be the first right to be forgotten case involving medical negligence by a doctor.
The judgment – available only in Dutch and heavily redacted – was handed down in July last year. But publication was delayed due to disputes over whether publication would compromise the anonymity not only of the claimant but of the other fifteen doctors on the blacklist. The claimant’s lawyer, reported in The Guardian, predicted that Google will “have to bring down thousands of pages” as a result of this ruling:
There is a medical disciplinary panel but Google has been the judge until now.
Background facts
The claimant was a surgeon who had been suspended by a disciplinary panel because of her postoperative care of a patient. This was changed to a conditional suspension after she appealed and she was allowed to continue practising.
21 January 2019
The latest episode of Law Pod UK features Guy Mansfield QC, who acted for the government in the Mau Mau action against the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office. In this group litigation over 40,000 Kenyans alleged abuse during the Kenyan Emergency of the 1950s and early 1960s. The various test cases led to a High Court judgments last year dismissing the claims for being out of time under the Limitation Act 1980. See Jo Moore’s post for the case citations referred to in the podcast, and also the more recent decision in Kimathi & Others [November 2018]
Other limitation cases referred to in the podcast are KR v Bryn Alyn [2003] A v Hoare [2008] and Jones & Ors v DECC [2012].
Law Pod UK is available for free on Audioboom, iTunes, Spotify, PodBean or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
10 January 2019
ARB v IVF Hammersmith & Another [2018] Civ 2803 (17 December 2018) – read judgment
Legal policy in the UK has traditionally prohibited the granting of damages for the wrongful conception or birth of a child in cases of negligence. In this case the Court of Appeal has confirmed that this bar is equally applicable to a wrongful birth arising from a breach of contract.
The facts of the case are set out in my podcast on the first instance decision (Episode 12 of Law Pod UK). Briefly, an IVF clinic had implanted the claimant father’s gametes into his former partner without his consent. This occurred after the couple had sought fertility treatment at the clinic resulting in the birth of a son some years previously. Following standard practice, the clinic froze five embryos made with their gametes. Subsequently, the couple separated. Some time after this separation the mother, R, attended the clinic without ARB and informed the staff that they had decided to have another child. The form requiring consent from ARB for thawing and implanting the embyro was signed by R, and the clinic failed to notice the forgery. R went on to give birth to a healthy daughter, E, who is now the sibling of ARB’s son. There is a Family Court order confirming parental responsibility and shared residence in respect of both children.
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7 January 2019
“No negligence where the doctors disagree” – used to be the approach of the courts to expert evidence in medical cases. That deference has eroded in recent years.
Rosalind English talks to James Badenoch QC, who acted for the claimant Montgomery in the most recent Supreme Court case on informed consent in medical cases.
Law Pod UK will be following up the debate on Bolam expert evidence in future episodes.
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10 December 2018
In the latest episode of Law Pod UK Rosalind English talks to Catriona Murdoch of 1 Crown Office Row about Global Rights Compliance, an organisation offering a unique approach to atrocity crimes and other violations of international law. The Hague-based GRC works in partnership with The World Peace Foundation (‘WPF’) to combine expertise on conflict and food insecurity. Together they are identifying how international law may be used to advance the prevention, prohibition and accountability for mass starvation.
Law Pod UK is available for free and without ads on Audioboom, iTunes, PodBean,The Podcast App or wherever you get your podcasts.
3 December 2018
In Episode No 56, Suzanne Lambert and Emma-Louise Fenelon discuss the recent judgment of Whipple J in YAH v Medway NHS Foundation Trust [2018] EWHC 2964 (QB)
In her analysis of the decision Suzanne refers to: the control mechanisms established by the House of Lords in Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire [1992] 1 AC 310, the House of Lords decision in Page v Smith [1996] 1 AC 155 and the decision of the Court of Appeal in A Liverpool Women’s Hospital NHS Foundation Trust v Ronayne [2015] EWCA Civ 588.
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30 November 2018
Conway, R (on the application of) v Secretary of State for Justice [2018] – read judgment
A man suffering from motor neurone disease has been refused permission to appeal to the Supreme Court in his bid to be allowed to choose when and how to die. He is now wheelchair bound and finds it increasingly difficult to breathe without the assistance of non-invasive mechanical ventilation (NIV). His legal campaign to win such a declaration, on his own behalf and others in a similar position, has met with defeat in the courts (see our previous posts on Conway here, here and here). As the Supreme Court noted in their short decision, Mr Conway
could bring about his own death in another way, by refusing consent to the continuation of his NIV. That is his absolute right at common law. Currently, he is not dependent on continuous NIV, so could survive for around at least one hour without it. But once he becomes dependent on continuous NIV, the evidence is that withdrawal would usually lead to his death within a few minutes, although it can take a few hours or in rare cases days.
But Mr Conway doesn’t see this as a solution to his difficulties, since he cannot predict how he will feel should ventilation be withdrawn, and whether he will experience the drowning sensation of not being able to breathe. Taking lethal medicine, he argued, would avoid all these problems.
In his view, which is shared by many, it is his life and he should have the right to choose to end it in the way which he considers most consistent with his human dignity.
29 November 2018
As part of our continuing collaboration with Professor Catherine Barnard of Cambridge University, we now have her latest episode on the Political Declaration on the withdrawal deal: Episode 55 of Law Pod UK. Towards the end of her 15 minute interview with Boni Sones Catherine talks about the Wightman reference to the CJEU from the Scottish Court of Session asking whether Article 50 can be revoked, and if it can be revoked, can it be done unilaterally by the UK or only bilaterally with the EU’s agreement. Exceptionally, the entire banc of the EU justices have just heard this case which indicates just how important this issue is; judgment awaited.
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23 November 2018
This week Law Pod UK, the podcast brought to you by the barristers at 1 Crown Office Row, surpassed 90 000 listens since our launch in May last year. Nobody could have predicted the runaway success of the podcast form a couple of years ago. Our short podcasts have proved enormously popular, not least because they provide updates on the latest legal developments with crisp discussion that absorbs the attention but lasts no longer than a short commute.
Rosalind English and Emma-Louise Fenelon present discussions with barristers, solicitors and academics on a wide range of topics including the recent Supreme Court decision in Darnley, human trafficking, clinical guidelines, and the impact of AI on the legal profession.
Intrigued? Subscribe to Law Pod UK via Apple Podcasts, iTunes, Audioboom or wherever you get your podcasts. And if you like what you hear, please remember to rate and review us. Your support is encouraging and we hope you can help us make 100,000 listens by Christmas.
Thank you to everyone who has listened and keep an eye out for the new episodes to be released shortly!
26 October 2018
WM Morrison Supermarkets Plc v Various Claimants [2018] EWCA 2339 (22 October 2018) – read judgment
The Court of Appeal has ruled that the supermarket chain was vicariously liable for one of its employees’ unlawful disclosure of personal data belonging to other employees even though this act took place away from the workplace and the was part of a sequence of planned events leading to the commission of this wrongdoing.
The central issue before the Court was whether an employer is liable in damages to those of its current or former employees whose personal and confidential information has been misused by being disclosed on the web by the criminal act of another employee, who had a grudge against the employer, in breach of the Data Protection Act 1998, and in breach of that employee’s obligation of confidence. The Court held that it did; the common law remedy of vicarious liability of an employer for its employee’s misuse of private information and breach of confidence was not expressly or impliedly excluded by the Data Protection Act 1998, notwithstanding that the Act itself excluded an employer’s liability for wrongful processing of personal data by an employee.
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26 October 2018
E.S. v Austria (Application no. 38450/12) 25 October 2018 – read judgment
In a judgment which has received instant and worldwide publicity, the Strasbourg Court has ruled that the Austrian government did not violate an individual’s freedom of expression when she was fined for saying at a 2009 seminar she gave on Islam that Mohammed had married one of his wives, Aisha, at the age of six and had intercourse with her from the age of nine. Although this would be classified as paedophilia today, the Austrian criminal court found that the insinuation that Mohamed had paedophilic tendencies amounted to an unlawful disparagement of religious doctrines. Because ,in modern society, paedophilia was behaviour which was ostracised by society and outlawed, it was evident that the applicant’s statements were capable of causing indignation. Defaming the prophet in this way went “beyond the permissible limits of an objective debate” and “could stir up prejudice and put at risk religious peace”. Thus her words had exceeded the permissible limits of freedom of expression.
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This blog is run by 1 Crown Office Row barristers' chambers. Subscribe for free updates here. The blog's editorial team is:
| Commissioning Editor: | Jonathan Metzer |
|---|---|
| Editorial Team: |
Rosalind English Angus McCullough QC David Hart QC Martin Downs Jim Duffy |
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