Search Results for: environmental/page/29/Freedom of information - right of access) [2015] UKUT 159 (AAC) (30 March 2015)
28 March 2017 by Thomas Beamont
The Labour MP Harriet Harman has proposed a change in the law that would prevent rape complainants from being cross-examined in court about their sexual history.
Harman claims that the introduction of a complainant’s sexual history as evidence has “no evidential value.” Describing the practice as “outdated”, Harman said that “it’s based on the old notion that there were two sorts of women – those who were ‘easy’ and those who were virtuous – and if you were easy, you would have sex with anybody, because you were that sort of woman.”
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8 March 2016 by Guest Contributor
The JUSTICE Student Conference 2016 is on 19 March 2016, at the University of Law in London. The full programme is available here and you can book online here.
Spend a Saturday talking human rights and the Human Rights Act with Dominic Grieve QC, Shami Chakrabarti of Liberty, and the JUSTICE team.
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7 February 2018 by Guest Contributor
When Britain joined the European Economic Community in 1973 along with Ireland and Denmark, it marked the first enlargement of what we today call the European Union. Since 1973, the club of the nine members has become a union of 28 member states. Most importantly, the law of the EU has developed significantly in terms of validity, scope and substance. What we were studied in the law school with EU law was in essence the institutions, the processes and the tools that are available for the European integration. And in fact EU law has achieved a remarkable degree of integration in some areas such as the Eurozone and the internal market. However, with Brexit, a new chapter is in the writing, this time on the withdrawal from the EU.
A constitutional pathology
The withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union after 44 years poses unprecedented legal challenges but provides useful lessons for the withdrawal process. Until today, this issue was a footnote in the textbooks, with the case of Greenland (which left in 1985) being the only precedent. Greenland joined the European Economic Community in 1973 with Denmark, then gained its autonomy (home rule) from Denmark in 1979 and in a referendum that took place in 1982, 53% percent of the population voted in favour of leaving the European Community. But it is beyond doubt that the exit of Greenland was much less complex, with the main topic for negotiation being the fishing industry.
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1 March 2011 by Adam Wagner
Updated | Association belge des Consommateurs Test-Achats ASBL, Yann van Vugt, Charles Basselier v Conseil des ministres, Case C‑236/09 – Read judgment / press release
The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has ruled that from December 2012, insurers will be prevented from charging different premiums on the basis of an insured person’s gender. A partner at a leading commercial law firm called September’s preemptive preliminary opinion “completely bonkers”. Can the same be said about the latest decision?
Coverage of the decision has already been largely negative. As well as involving Europe’s increasingly unpopular and possibly unelected judges, the ruling affects an interest group – insurance companies – with deep pockets and who are capable of sophisticated lobbying. And nobody wants to see their insurance premiums go up, if that is indeed to be the outcome of this ruling, something which is by no means clear. So expect to see plenty of critical articles. The Telegraph website is already sporting an unchallenged article/press release from Esure, including a video interview which begins with an advert for ESure’s “Sheila’s Wheels”.
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10 September 2018 by Eleanor Leydon
Image Credit: Guardian
NAVTEJ SINGH JOHAR & ORS VS. UNION OF INDIA, THR. SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF LAW AND JUSTICE: India’s supreme court has unanimously ruled that section 377 of the penal code, which criminalises consensual sex acts between same sex adults, is unconstitutional.
The judgment accordingly decriminalises gay sex, in a landmark ruling for gay rights. Chief Justice Dipak Misra said in his decision that “Criminalising carnal intercourse under section 377 Indian penal code is irrational, indefensible and manifestly arbitrary.”
The 160-year-old law was imposed on India by the British empire as part of a package of laws against public vice. Thursday’s judgment follows 24 years of legal challenges: most recently, the Delhi high court ruled against section 377 in 2009, but was overturned by the supreme court in 2013.
The breakthrough for lawyers came in August 2017, when the supreme court held that there was a fundamental right to privacy. In an unprecedented move, five judges commented in that judgment that the 2013 section 377 decision was wrong.
Trinidad & Tobago’s high court will also rule this month on whether to decriminalise sex between men, and similar rulings on decriminalising gay sex are awaited in Kenya and Botswana.
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8 June 2023 by Anna Moody
In the news
The UK’s role in the torture of detainees following the 9/11 attacks, is in question. Last week, the investigatory powers tribunal announced that, on grounds of public interest, they will examine complaints “of the gravest possible kind” which were brought by Mustafa al-Hawsawi against the UK’s intelligence services. Al-Hawsawi was detained in secret CIA prisons and tortured between 2003 and 2006, having been accused of aiding the September 11 attacks. It is alleged that in this time, UK intelligence “aided, abetted, encouraged, facilitated, procured and/or conspired” with the US in Al-Hawsawi’s torture. A related issue concerning the conduct of the CIA is also being heard by the Supreme Court in the case of Zubaydah v Foreign and Commonwealth Office and others next week.
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4 February 2014 by Guest Contributor
The business of the law can tend to harden the heart – but every now and then a case comes along that drives off the spectre of compassion fatigue. This was the effect of a recent libel claim in which I obtained substantial damages and published apologies for a 20-year-old Afghan refugee, Abdul Shizad, who – despite being entirely alone in the UK and having limited English – had the courage to sue the Daily Express, which had falsely accused him of being a “Taliban Suspect”.
The Express’s timing was particularly superlative, its 4 March 2013 article “Now Judges Let Taliban Suspect Stay” coming just a month after Abdul had succeeded in a stressful and exhausting 4 year quest for asylum in the UK.
Accompanied by a most unflattering photograph of two unsuspecting “Judges”, the article lambasted “a new human rights scandal” in which “judges have said a suspected Taliban member can stay in Britain”.
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22 July 2012 by David Hart KC
Khaira v. Shergill [2012] EWCA Civ 893 read judgment
We have become used to the courts getting involved, more or less willingly, in religious issues, not least where religious freedoms conflict with legal rules which are said to be inconsistent with the exercise of those freedoms. But as Adam Wagner pointed out, in an earlier round of this litigation concerning two Sikh places of worship (Gurdwaras), the courts have developed rules stopping themselves from deciding certain cases, not least because the courts recognise they don’t know what they are doing once they get themselves immersed in issues of religious doctrine.
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30 December 2012 by Adam Wagner
2012 has been a busy year on the UK human rights front, never short of controversy, hyperbole and even some interesting points of legal principle along the way.
Here are some of the biggest stories from April to June 2012. The first part of this post, January to March, is here. Feel free to comment on my choices, and add your own if you think something is missing.
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9 May 2022 by Rosalind English
Voting for the Northern Ireland Assembly took place on Thursday 5 May. This year, for the first time, Sinn Fein looks set to win a majority of the seats. Whether the Democratic Unionist Party agrees to the power sharing arrangement where it is relegated to second place remains to be seen. What continues to be hotly debated is the Northern Ireland Protocol, put in place to avoid a “hard border” between Northern Ireland and Ireland which of course is still part of the EU single market.
But the Protocol isn’t only about trade. Under Article 2 the UK government has made an important commitment regarding the rights of Northern Ireland’s citizens to equality, non-discrimination, transparency and a range of other rights protected under European Union law. Article of the 2 Protocol is a very new provision, applying the acquis communitaire of the CJEU to Northern Ireland, even though NI is part of post Brexit EU.
In our latest episode Rosalind English meets UKHRB Northern Ireland correspondent Anurag Deb in Belfast two days after the elections to discuss what this EU rights provision means for the citizens of Northern Ireland.
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11 January 2021 by Hugo Murphy
In the news:
Last week’s round-up looked at the measures and messaging of the UK’s latest lockdown. This week we ask what it means for vulnerable children and victims of domestic abuse. Are sufficient legal safeguards in place?
For vulnerable children, it unfortunately seems not. On Wednesday, a Guardian investigation revealed that thousands of children were sent to unregulated care homes last year, while local authority provisions were stretched throughout many months of restrictions. These homes include supported accommodation facilities for over 16s, which are not subject to any inspections by regulators in England and Wales. The Children’s Commissioner for England Anne Longfield has warned that the children’s care system has been ‘left to slip deeper into crisis, seemingly unable to stop some of the most vulnerable children from falling through the gaps.’
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7 November 2014 by Michael Deacon
R (on the application of FI) v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2014] EWCA Civ 1272 – read judgment
The Court of Appeal has held that the physical restraint of persons being removed from the UK by aircraft is subject to a sufficient framework of safeguards to fulfil the state’s obligations under Articles 2 and 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights. Further, the decision of the Home Secretary not to publish aspects of the applicable policy on the use of such control and restraint is lawful.
FI was restrained by detainee custody officers during an attempt to remove her from the UK in 2011, though the issues on this appeal did not turn on the specific circumstances of her case. In issue was the sufficiency of the framework of safeguards on the use of such restraint as contained predominantly within the Use of Force Training Manual (the “Manual”).
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11 June 2010 by Adam Wagner
The Guardian claims to have access to key findings of the long awaited inquiry into the Bloody Sunday killings of 30 January 1972, and some of the soldiers implicated may now face prosecution almost 40 years after the event.
The Inquiry was set up to investigate the events surrounding a march in the Bogside area of Derry in 1972 when 29 protesters were shot by British soldiers, leading to 13 deaths.
Lord Saville’s report, which marks the conclusion of the longest and most expensive public inquiry in British history, “will conclude that a number of the fatal shootings of civilians by British soldiers were unlawful killings“. However, the Guardian has not revealed where its information originates from, or how the shootings were “unlawful”, which could mean a number of different things.
The report is to be published on Tuesday 15 June at 3pm. The Inquiry’s website, which also has transcripts of the hearings, can be found here.
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9 February 2010 by Adam Wagner
Binyam Mohamed
Read our case comment here
The Government has lost its appeal (see the BBC report) against the Divisional Court’s decision to order it to release an unredacted version of an email relating to the “cruel, inhuman and degrading” treatment which Binyam Mohamed received during questioning by the Americans. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) had previously argued that to release the full email would damage national security. The full email can now be read on the FCO website.
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11 August 2010 by Adam Wagner
Ken Clarke
The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) is to cut £2bn from its £9bn or so budget. But where will this 20% cut come from?
Kenneth Clarke’s MoJ are said to have got in early in agreeing spending reduction targets with the Treasury, and yesterday it was reported by the Public and Commercial Services Union that senior staff were informed by email that the cuts will amount to around £2bn of the overall budget. The Union suspect that around 15,000 of the MoJ’s 80,000 staff may have to be axed.
However the MoJ makes the cuts, a reduction of around 20% is likely to have severe effects on access to and provision of justice in the United Kingdom. Various MoJ-funded bodies have already been lining up to explain why their departments could not survive on much less. The criminal legal aid system has long been said to be in crisis, the President of the Family Division indicated last week that the child protection system is in grave danger of imploding, and the Chief Executive of the Supreme Court has said the cuts could cripple the new court.
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