Tag Archives: Lawyers

Politics: the latest lies from Westminister (the news in tweets, Wednesday, July 26, 2023)

Rishi Sunak: another UK prime minister has been caught lying to the public.

Outrage as Sunak’s claims about the Labour Party and lawyers ‘undermine the rule of law’

Rishi Sunak has disgraced himself and his government again, with a false claim that the Labour Party and “a subset of lawyers” are supporting alleged criminal gangs who are said to be bringing people into the UK from abroad for illegal purposes.

Here’s his claim:

It isn’t true and it has provoked a storm of outrage – particularly as previous falsehoods by Sunak have led to an attempt on one solicitor’s life.

Pamela Fitzpatrick, who is director of Harrow Law Centre, tweeted: “This is completely irresponsible of Sunak. Solicitors are officers of the Court subject to a professional code of conduct. This type of misinformation by Sunak has already led to a far right extremist trying to kill a Harrow immigration Solicitor. It must stop.”

This appears to be a reference to alleged far-right extremist Cavan Medlock, who was accused of trying to murder Harrow immigration solicitor Toufique Hossain because “he objected to the solicitor Hossain’s involvement in preventing the Government from deporting immigrants”.

The alleged attack took place on September 7, 2020. It seems likely to have been provoked by claims such as this, from Sunak’s Tory colleague, then-Home Secretary Priti Patel:

The trial was last reported to be taking place on June 26 this year – but This Writer can find no report of it. News blackout?

Going back to Sunak’s allegation, there is no evidence that the Labour Party – even in its current incarnation as a Substitute Tory Party (STP) – has ever supported people-trafficking by criminal gangs.

And shadow immigration minister Stephen Kinnock has called for the Solicitors’ Regulation Authority to launch an inquiry into any attempt to help people get into the UK under false pretences, according to the Mirror.

Fellow Labour MP Chris Bryant also condemned Sunak’s claim: “In his desperation he has plumbed a new depth… He debases his office and forgets act as PM of the United Kingdom not seek to sow division.”

And shadow Attorney General Emily Thornberry tweeted: “Usually, I try and maintain some sense of respect for the office of the Prime Minister, but it’s just impossible when the man doing the job is willing to demean it like this. What a desperate attempt to deflect from his own dismal failures. Utterly pathetic.”

The Bar Council – the organisation representing all barristers in England and Wales – stated: “The comments by the Prime Minister… are clearly an attempt to play politics with the legal profession. This damaging rhetoric undermines the rule of law, trust in lawyers and confidence in the UK legal system and is to be deplored.”

For the sake of accuracy, the organisation had to also state: “Lawyers are not beyond reproach, and all professions have individuals who commit misconduct and are dishonest. Regulators are there to discipline them.” Sunak is likely to point to this as evidence to support his wafer-thin claim.

It’s not likely to sway thinking members of the public. For example:

“Sunak did not get into politics to make a better world for the people of Britain – only to make more money for himself and his rich friends – and now his grubby inhumanity is exposed for all to see. Better he had never been PM and that his inadequacy had remained his secret,” tweeted science journalist Marcus Chown.

Finally, there is a question over whether Sunak’s government colluded with the Daily Mail on the article, in order to have some kind of “fig leaf” with which to cover its draconian and internationally-illegal new measures against people fleeing persecution in foreign countries.

Here’s another member of the law-practising community that Sunak has attacked:

Zionist origins of BBC reporter who challenged politician on anti-Semitism raise serious question about BBC impartiality

Strange. When This Writer was trained as a journalist, I was taught to be fair and impartial – that is, not to colour my reporting of events with falsehoods.

Now it seems the BBC – the biggest news organisation in the world, if I recall correctly – is employing people with an ideological bias towards the exact opposite.

Samantha Simmonds, the interviewer who reeled off false claims of anti-Semitism against the Labour Party under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, was a member of a Zionist group and may have had an interest in discrediting the former leader and his supporters.

If she allowed her own personal politics to slant her on-air reporting, the BBC should be considering this to be a very serious matter indeed.

Watch her interview again and see how she presented falsehoods as facts and, when countered by former Uxbridge and South Ruislip Labour chair David Williams with the truth, cut him off:

The BBC relies heavily on its reputation as a factual news reporter – and its dominance of the news media means a majority of the public relies on it too.

When one of its representatives is found to be regurgitating untrue propaganda for political ends (Jeremy Corbyn sought a peaceful solution for the Israel/Palestine question, including freedom for Palestine and Zionism demands that all Palestinian territory must become part of Israel, with its inhabitants thrown out), it brings the integrity of the BBC as a whole into question.

Knowing what has happened here, will you be ready to believe BBC reporting on the next big controversy?

If you want to complain, the BBC has a web page telling you how to do so. Feel free to use it.

Keir Starmer claims he’ll give every child ‘the best opportunities’ – after condemning hundreds of thousands to poverty

The propaganda piece accompanying Starmer’s tweet seems to have been created to head off criticism of his decision to keep a quarter of a million children in poverty – and a further 850,000 in deep poverty – by extending the Tory child benefit cap into any Parliament run by a party led by him.


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Abuse of Roger Waters hits new low with Anne Frank ‘trade mark’ claim

The issue: it seems a group calling itself UK Lawyers for Israel doesn’t like the name of Anne Frank (who was a Jew) being associated with that of Shireen Abu Akley (a Palestinian).

Who would be disrespecting the memory of Anne Frank the most in this situation: Roger Waters for using her name to make an argument against hate, or the Anne Frank Foundation for suing him over an alleged breach of its trade mark?

It’s a hypothetical situation, of course. This Writer hopes nobody at the Anne Frank Foundation would be unreasonable enough to take it that far.

It’s not the Anne Frank Foundation that has even raised the issue, you see. It’s a group here in the UK, called UK Lawyers for Israel.

An article on that organisation’s website states:

Waters used the name Anne Frank to defame Israel by comparing Shireen Abu Akleh with Anne Frank, as shown in photographs posted on Twitter.

Shireen Abu Akleh was an American journalist of Palestinian Arab extraction who was killed in the course of an Israeli military operation in Jenin last year. The Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) have accepted that there is a high possibility that an Israeli soldier fired the bullet that killed her, but deny any intention to kill a non-combatant journalist. Roger Waters’ display was evidently intended to suggest that Abu Akleh, like Anne Frank, was murdered by evil fascists, and that the IDF are like the Nazis (a typical example of antisemitism according to the IHRA definition).

During the concert, Waters also dressed up as an SS officer.

Anne Frank Stichting registered “Anne Frank” as a trademark inter alia in Class 41 for entertainment services in various jurisdictions. Roger Waters’ abuse of the mark seems liable to harm its functions and without due cause to take unfair advantage of its distinctive character and repute and/or to be detrimental to the distinctive character or repute, thereby infringing the rights of the Anne Frank Stichting.

There might also be infringement of personality rights inherited by Anne Frank Stichting in some jurisdictions.

Let me get this straight: an organisation in the UK, of lawyers who support Israel, wants an organisation in the Netherlands to take action against the star of a concert that happened in Germany, because it mentioned in passing a name that the Dutch group has trademarked?

There are several issues here: first, Anne Frank was a person. Reducing her to a trademarked name and then litigating against someone else for using that name would be dehumanising behaviour that, in my opinion, may count as anti-Semitic in itself. I can’t see the Anne Frank Stichtung acting in that way, personally. UKLFI may need to reconsider its own approach also.

What would a lawsuit be about – infringement of a trade mark or defamation of Israel? If the latter, then it is nothing to do with the Anne Frank Stichtung.

The use of her name for entertainment purposes would also be problematic, I think. Was the concert advertised as having anything to do with Anne Frank? Was her name on display throughout the performance, or only for a period amounting to seconds? Is there any reason to believe that people attended the show in question (in Berlin, in mid-May) because of the use of Anne Frank’s name? If not, then it seems unlikely a trade mark infringement suit would have any traction. Mention of her would likely come under the category “fair use”.

The connection with Shireen Abu Akleh would also need to be scrutinised. Were the two names projected as described by UKLFI, one immediately after the other, or were they separated by other names? If they were separated, then how is Israel defamed? Whether they were or not, what other names were also projected? What were the reasons those names were also used? Is it reasonable to suggest that the names were projected for entertainment purposes, or to make an argument, and in that case, what is the argument supporting – hate, or peace?

If UKLFI is arguing that Roger Waters wrongly equates the death of Anne Frank with that of Shireen Abu Akleh (perhaps claiming that he was saying both were caused by invading oppressors), then the circumstances of Shireen Abu Akleh’s death would have to be explored. Jenin is a city in Palestine; what were Israel Defence Forces doing there if not invading from another country? What were their activities there intended to convey to the inhabitants, if not oppression? What reason did they have for using projectile weapons in a space where non-combatant civilians might be harmed, if not fatal harm? Can it be proved that criticism of the Israeli government and military for carrying out the “operation” and causing the harm that it did is unfounded? If it cannot, than how can Israel be defamed by what Roger Waters has said about this incident?

When in the concert did Roger Waters state that the Israeli Defence Forces are “evil fascists”?

When did he say the IDF are “like Nazis”?

And – in the context in which mention of Anne Frank and Shireen Abu Akleh were mentioned – is it unreasonable to have made such a comparison? Was there a correlation between the behaviour of the Nazis towards Anne Frank and that of the IDF towards Shireen Abu Akleh?

Does UKLFI really want that tested in court, considering the likely consequences if a judge rules that it is reasonable to compare the behaviour of the Nazis and IDF and find it similar?

Worse for UKLFI is the claim that “Waters also dressed up as an SS officer”, which is not true and undermines UKLFI’s credibility.

Finally, Roger Waters’s lawyers will have been all over this. If any court action did ensue, I expect they would squash it in short order.

Add it all together and This Writer thinks it would be very difficult to make an argument in support of a lawsuit – whether for trade mark infringement or defamation (and I know a thing or two about defamation).

Finally, this is a worthwhile point, also:

Fair point? Note also that the Twitter user above does not speak for Roger Waters and their opinions must be treated as their own.

Ultimately, This Writer’s opinion is that the claims made by UKLFI are unlikely to be able to stop Roger Waters behaving as he has, may do nothing to improve the standing of Israel, and may actually harm the name of Anne Frank.

Am I right?


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Partygate: should we be asking if Boris Johnson spent public money on lawyers?

Money, money, money: a lawyer has claimed Boris Johnson could have escaped a second Partygate fine by getting ‘lawyered up’ – but if so, who footed the bill? And shouldn’t all these cases have been handled in the same way – the way in which the lowliest civil servant was treated?

A criminal defence lawyer has suggested that Boris Johnson, and possibly other senior Tory politicians, escaped Partygate fines because they employed expensive lawyers to rubbish the evidence.

And Lucinda Nicholls told the I that the Metropolitan Police may also have been swayed by the fact that Johnson is the Prime Minister – putting the lie to the claim that everybody in the UK is equal in the eyes of the law.

Stressing that she could not “state categorically” the reasons for the Met’s deicsion, Lucinda Nicholls, told i: “I think what probably happened is they [the Met] were more susceptible to receiving the information about the circumstances because he was Prime Minister, which would never have happened if you were a member of the public.

Ms Nicholls… added: “I am sure and I know that every single person with the Government, all of the ministers, that were part of the investigation were lawyered up.

“And I know that the amount of money these particular lawyers would have cost, they would have ensured that there was some sort of senior personnel within the police that would have been dealing with this.

“He [Mr Johnson] has the funds available to him to engage with the authorities in order to minimise the risks and negotiate the process. Joe Bloggs on the street doesn’t.”

Does that strike any of you as hugely unfair? If it’s accurate, I think it would be.

It’s also more than a little suspicious, considering how strapped-for-cash Johnson always claims to be.

Should I be making a Freedom of Information request to find out if any public money was spent defending Johnson? And should the police be probed to find out if they really were impartial in their handling of Partygate suspects?

Source: Partygate: Why Boris Johnson escaped with just one fine for Covid breach, according to a legal expert

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Is Priti Patel’s latest pronouncement an attempt to have homeless people murdered?

I’m only using this image because I haven’t got one of her dressed as a Nazi.

‘Dumpy she-Hitler’ Priti Patel is at it again, it seems.

Only a day after it was claimed her attack on “activist lawyers” she said were frustrating the removal of migrants led to a “violent, racist attack” in a London law firm by a knife-wielding man – who actually injured a staffer…

… she is now calling for homeless people to be deported:

Priti Patel has been criticised for allegedly planning to deport homeless people who repeatedly engage in low level crimes.

The home secretary has reportedly asked Home Office officials to discuss new immigration rules that would make it easier to deport rough sleepers who engage in “persistent anti-social or dangerous behaviour”.

It is understood Patel wrote to ministers on Friday to inform them of the plans, according to the Mail on Sunday.

After it was revealed, the scheme was blasted by commentators who warned “somebody is going to end up getting hurt”.

Damn right – somebody is going to get hurt. Most likely, it will be a homeless person (or many), attacked by people of similar mentality to the knife-wielder in the London law firm mentioned above. Or the lawyers trying to stop them being sent to Ascension Island.

And it occurs to me that Priti Patel must know this.

She knows that somebody got hurt after she had a go at “activist lawyers”.

Only an irresponsible (or psychotic), homicidal fascist would then suggest that another societal group should be targeted for deportation in those circumstances.

But that is exactly what she has done.

So it seems to me that the UK now has a Home Secretary who is deliberately trying to incite people to commit the crime of murder.

Source: Priti Patel criticised for ‘planning to deport homeless people’

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Patel resumes refugee deportation – and attacks on ‘activist lawyers’. Why aren’t her own legals on strike?

The Home Office tweet about ‘activist lawyers’ that was released only a week ago. Officials have been barred from using the phrase but the Home Secretary continues to do so.

If I was a lawyer working for the Tory government, I would be on strike from today in solidarity with my “activist” colleagues whose only interest is in ensuring that the UK’s government does not break the law.

Priti Patel, the Home Secretary, has tweeted that deportations of refugees who came to the UK by small boat have resumed with a flight to Spain.

She stated that this happened in spite of “activist lawyers” – in an act of defiance against those who achieved a ruling from her permanent secretary that the use of the phrase by Home Office officials was inappropriate.

Unfortunately Matthew Rycroft’s pronouncement does not apply to the Home Secretary herself, so she broadcast this on Twitter:

The tweet has provoked a wave of protest, which This Writer expects was exactly what Patel wanted:

Yes, I think it’s what she wanted – because for every tweet in protest, she’ll have roused people like this commenter:

It creates division.

And division allows Tories to act without inhibition – and the rule of law is diminished in favour of Tory dictatorship.

The tweeter who complained about migrants moving into the North of England has received angry replies, meaning that smaller arguments are breaking out, diminishing the larger point against Patel:

You see how it works?

That’s why I say the best response to Patel would be a strike by people in the legal profession working for the government.

But will it happen?

Or are government lawyers far more interested in fat salaries than in upholding the law itself?

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‘Loudmouthed lawyers’ jibe shows it’s the Home Office that doesn’t know when to shut up

Devilish advocate: Priti Patel has set her Home Office against the rule of law.

What unbelievable arrogance from “a government source” – as quoted, we’re told, in The Times.

After the Home Office was forced to withdraw a video tweet referring to “activist lawyers”, that was posted in retaliation after solicitors prevented Priti Patel’s thugs from illegally – mark that word – deporting 23 asylum-seekers without appeal, what did the Tory government have to say for itself?

Here:

“There’s a bunch of particularly loudmouthed lawyers and barristers who seem to spend more time on social media than representing their clients.”

This is arrogant disregard of the rule of law.

Perhaps the “government source” who said this should be named and removed from Whitehall to a place where they can do no more harm.

Ms Patel should be rushing to Whitehall, to deliver a grovelling public apology to the lawyers mentioned – who can all be identified very easily – and to the nation.

Really, she should be resigning as she has clearly allowed standards at the Home Office to fall far below what is expected in a government department.

Not only has this matter been a scandal but it has also been revealed that the Windrush Compensation Scheme is being bungled because Home Office officals have an “institutional ignorance and thoughtlessness towards the issue of race”.

Patel is responsible; unlike wealth, this is an instance where the “trickle-down effect” really does work and, as the novelist Henry Fielding implied in the 1740’s, the poison seeps down from the top.

But Patel won’t go. Her kind believe they are entitled to their bare-faced, flaunting immorality.

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Home Office deletes “fascist Dad’s Army” ‘migrants’ clip released after it was forced to abandon deportation flight

It seems there was more to the Home Office’s video clip about “activist lawyers” than met the eye – and that was already pretty bad.

Apparently the government had been forced to abandon a deportation flight to Spain after last-minute legal challenges meant all 23 passengers had to be allowed off the plane.

It seems that HO had tried to rush through the deportations fast, in order to deny these asylum-seekers the right to appeal; that would be breaking the law. All the lawyers did was insist that these people be allowed their legal rights.

In response, the government department released the tweet attacking “activist lawyers” who “delay and disrupt returns”.

So it seems the line saying, “Soon we will no longer be bound by EU laws and can negotiate our own return arrangements,” was an attempt to taunt those lawyers.

That was a mistake. It provoked complaints – some of them from the lawyers who carry out these actions.

So now the tweet has come down and HO permanent secretary Matthew Rycroft has issued instructions that the term “activist lawyers” should not be used again.

The most effective complaint seems to have come from the economist Jonathan Portes. This Site has huge respect for this gentleman, going back to discussions of the UK economy here many years ago.

He posted a thread showing part of the response he received:

Later, he added this:

By this time, some of the lawyers concerned had already taken to Twitter to put their side of the story across – and it makes interesting reading:

It’s another own-goal for Boris Johnson’s Tory government – and the Home Office that Johnson insists must be run by Priti Patel.

Source: Home Office wrong to refer to ‘activist lawyers’, top official admits | Home Office | The Guardian

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Workfare ruling leaves too many questions unanswered

Cait Reilly, the graduate who was forced to leave her voluntary work in a museum to stack shelves at Poundland on the government’s Workfare scheme, has lost her case against the government.
Mr Justice Foskitt, at the High Court in London, said, “characterising such a scheme as involving or being analogous to ‘slavery’ or ‘forced labour’ seems to me to be a long way from contemporary thinking”.
What an interesting choice of words!
Back at the turn of the century, contemporary thinking stated that a woman’s place was in the home, and that she must never contradict her husband, take a job, or be allowed the right to vote. A few decades ago, contemporary thinking about homosexuality forced Alan Turing, the Bletchworth Park genius who cracked the Enigma code, thereby hugely boosting the Allies’ chances of winning World War II, to commit suicide.
Contemporary thinking has been responsible for terrible injustices and this is one of them.
I wonder if he really meant “contemporary thinking”, anyway. Did he, in fact, mean it’s a long way from what the government of the day thinks?
The judge ruled that Workfare does not contravene article 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which prohibits forced labour and slavery.
A friend of mine looked up “slave” in the dictionary and found among its definitions the following: “A person who is forced to work for another against his will” and “A person who works in harsh conditions for low pay”.
I think we can agree that Cait Reilly was made to work at Poundland against her will (we’ll get to the failings of the DWP’s correspondence in a moment) and, while I can’t comment on the conditions, it is certain that her benefit payment was below minimum wage and therefore, by definition, was low pay.
So by dictionary definitions, she was a slave. Perhaps the judge was commenting on the fact that the legal definition needs to be rewritten?
It wasn’t all good news for the government, though. Although this scheme will remain unpaid, it seems it must be totally voluntary, and communications between the DWP and claimants must reflect this. In other words, the DWP must clean up its correspondence to make it clear that claimants can say no.
Those who have already had their benefits removed for refusing Workfare might now be entitled to compensation. Law firm Public Interest Lawyers, who acted for Ms Reilly, said more than 22,000 people had been stripped of their benefits for refusing Workfare by January 2012. By now (August) this figure may have doubled.
The DWP has announced that it will appeal against the decision. A spokesman has been quoted by the Guardian, saying: “We do not believe there is anything wrong with the original letters and we will appeal this aspect of the judgment, but in the meantime we have revised our standard letters.”
This begs the obvious question: If there was nothing wrong with the original letters, why change them?
The saddest fact about the case is that none of the above touches the real problems with Workfare.
It is not the taxpayers’ responsibility to pay the wages of people employed by a private company. If Poundland wants people to stack its shelves, it should hire them at a living wage, rather than ask the government to provide workers and pay them only in state benefits.
Poundland’s annual profit in 2010 was £21,500,000. Split among its 390-odd stores, that’s more than £54,000 – or enough to pay three extra employees, per store, on minimum wage, with cash to spare. Make it a decent, living wage, and that’s still two extra employees (with a lot more cash to spare).
It could be argued that Poundland has been providing a public service for the government by taking on Workfare jobseekers when it didn’t need any more employees. If this is the case, we must ask why Cait Reilly was promised a job interview at the end of it. The fact that the promised interview never happened, I think, also provides our answer: Poundland has been taking advantage of the scheme to get cheap labour.
If that is true, then the company has gained financial benefit from having Ms Reilly – and others on Workfare – stacking its shelves. Poundland has made money from it, so Poundland should pay all those working for the company a decent wage – including those on Workfare who have helped create that profit.
If this does not happen, then no employer in his or her right mind would think of paying the full amount for an employee when they can get them on Workfare instead, and have the taxpayer foot the bill. Workfare is therefore a way of ensuring that the current lack of full-time jobs continues into the future.
At a time when the government is complaining that the benefits bill is too high – and trying to blame that on so-called workshy scroungers fraudulently claiming they are disabled (fraud rate on those is less than 0.4 per cent) – it is insane for ministers to send those on benefits to work for profitable firms at no cost to the employer.