CBC reports:
Cheques will be phased out in the U.K. by late 2018, the agency that oversees payment systems in the country decided Wednesday.
- Garry J. Wise, Toronto
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Washington Post reports on yesterday's opening of the new, U.K. Supreme Court, which replaces the venerable Law Lords as the nation's court of last resort:
Queen Elizabeth II formally opened Britain's new Supreme Court on Friday in a ceremony attended by high court justices from the United States and around the world.
Prime Minister Gordon Brown and top judges from Canada, Australia, India, South Africa and Europe attended the ceremony for a court the government says will make the workings of justice visible and accessible to the British public.
U.S. Chief Justice John Roberts and justices Stephen Breyer and Antonin Scalia watched the ceremony, which included prayers led by Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams and a verse for the new court by former poet laureate Andrew Motion.
For more background on the modernization of the U.K. judicial system, also see:
- Garry J. Wise, Toronto
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Times Online on the U.K.'s shift from the House of Lords to a new Supreme Court:
Today the law lords sit to give judgment for the last time in the House of Lords and, as Lord Hope of Craighead said there last week, the upper chamber will be “losing part of itself”. From October the law lords will become Justices of the Supreme Court, created under the Constitutional Reform Act 2005. As the law lords give judgments for the last time, we should celebrate the institution whose life is coming to an end.
...The cry of the doorkeepers, John Dryden and Jackie Mouzouros, of “Clear the Bar”, so the law lords can deliberate at the end of the argument, will be heard no more. The Bar and the judges will be cleared out across Parliament Square to the Supreme Court.
As Lord Mance described it, in one of the final speeches by a law lord in Parliament, they will be moving from the Palace of Westminster to the new “Palais de Justice”. But before we lawyers pick up our papers and leave, we should pause to reflect on the end of an era.
- Garry J. Wise, Toronto
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As noted last week, effective today, British media has new-found access to the nation's Family Courts, which had previously been closed to the press.
If judges and court staff were ready for what has been hailed as a revolution in the family courts, lawyers at Barnet’s Civil and Family Court Centre were slightly taken by surprise by the arrival of the media.
Two cases had to be adjourned while lawyers discussed whether to oppose the admittance of The Times, but both, in the end, agreed — realising that stringent reporting restrictions remain in place.
After decades of holding such hearings behind closed doors, no one quite knew what to do. John Tughan, counsel for Haringey — the local authority where Baby P died — at least had on him the guidance on admitting the media just issued by Britain’s most senior judge.
But he confessed to Judge Marcia Levy: “I don’t know what our position is . . . I simply don’t know. I was asking for ten minutes to take instructions from the team manager.”
The judge, who was preparing to give an hour-long judgment in a case involving two young children, said that neither their names, nor those of other children involved, could be mentioned; nor those of the parents, nor schools, places or anyone else connected with them that would enable them to be identified.
- Garry J. Wise, Toronto
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U.K Lawyers concerned that Open divorce courts will lead warring spouses to 'blackmail.'
- Garry J. Wise, Toronto
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It isn't exactly a fashion update, but this Times Online report highlights yet another aspect of the modernization of Britain's judicial system:
For 300 years the wig and gown have symbolised the authority of the court. All that will change in October, when judges in civil and family cases will ditch their horsehair wigs and instead be dressed by a designer whose trademark is “funky British clothes for aspiring funky British girls”.
...The robe, designed by Betty Jackson, replaces the wig, wing collar and bands and black gown. Lord Phillips said that it was “very comfortable” and easier to get on and off, removing the need to remove collars and ties to put on wing collars and bands.
Not having to wear a wig, especially in hot weather, would be very welcome, he added. The gown is made of a dark navy gaberdine and wool mix, trimmed with velvet on the cuffs and facings. The version for women has a pleated white removable ruff.
Coloured bands incorporated in the outfit are a nod to tradition and denote seniority. There is gold for the Court of Appeal judges and heads of High Court divisions; red for the High Court judges; lilac for circuit judges when they sit as deputy High Court judges; blue for the district judges. The colour for masters and registrars has yet to be decided.
- Garry J. Wise, Toronto
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Employers in the Canada and in the United Kingdom have a legal obligation to protect their employees from sexual harassment in the workplace.
Typical discussion of this obligation has focussed on the employer's duty to protect its employees from sexual harassment by other employees.
As of next week, however, employers in the U.K. will also have a specific legal obligation to protect their employees from sexual harassment advanced by third parties such as clients and customers.
The Guardian.com reports:
Employers will be duty-bound from next week to protect their staff from sexual harassment by customers, suppliers and others they encounter in the course of their work. Workers are already protected from harassment by colleagues, but under new rules which come into force on April 6, they will be able to seek damages from employers who fail to take reasonable steps to protect them from harassment by a third party, if bosses knew that at least two incidents had already taken place.
The government was forced to change the law after the then Equal Opportunities Commission - now part of the Equality and Human Rights Commission - won a ruling that the government had failed to properly implement the European equal treatment directive, which requires workers to be protected from "any unwanted conduct related to their sex which violates their dignity or creates an intimidating, hostile, degrading, humiliating or offensive environment".
The rules are expected to have their biggest impact in the catering, hotel and retail trades. The EOC told the high court that sexual harassment by customers was rife in the hotel and restaurant industry, which employs 670,000 women.
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Just so you can't say we aren't meeting all of your celebrity justice needs:
McCartney divorce costs Beatle US$48.7-million - National Post- Garry J. Wise, Toronto
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On Wednesday March 5, 2008, Britain's House of Lords formally abolished the United Kingdom's ancient common law against blasphemy.
Highlights from Hansard of the Lords' debate include this distinguished, and oh-so-very-British speech from one Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer in support of abolition:
I also remind noble Lords that this is the fifth time that this House has considered this issue. It was previously considered in 2005 during the passage of the Racial and Religious Hatred Bill, in 2002 during the Religious Offences Bill, in 2001 during the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Bill, and in 1995 during the Blasphemy (Abolition) Bill. At each stage, Parliament has had the same information before it and has been able to draw on the results of serious parliamentary scrutiny.
That the law has fallen into disuse is evident from the fact that there have been no public prosecutions in almost 90 years—since 1922—and it has been more than 30 years since the last private prosecution. In fact, coming new to this debate, I asked my officials to go back a little further. There was hardly a rash of prosecutions before 1922. I have been able to find only two cases. The first was in 1676, when a Mr Taylor was made to stand in the pillory "in three several places" and had to pay a 1,000 marks fine for,
“uttering of divers blasphemous expressions horrible to hear”.
Hard on the heels of that event, there was one in 1841, when a Mr Haslam, in a pamphlet castigating the clergy of all denominations, described the Old Testament as “wretched stuff” and a “disgrace to orang-utans”. That was 20 years before the great Oxford debates on belief, religion and science. I am assured by my noble friend Lady Hollis, who knows about these things, that that case was probably something to do with the secularist movement and the Chartists. I am sure that she is right. Its author was described as a random idiot and he was held guilty of blasphemous libel and of appealing to the wild and improper feelings of the human mind—I suggest, anticipating notions of civil strife. It was 80 years before the law was invoked again.
... I am making this excursion into history not to be flippant—far from it—but simply to illustrate that, when we say that the law has fallen into disuse, perhaps we should really say that the law has never been found to be usable. The recognition that the offences appear to be moribund was reinforced by the High Court’s decision on 5 December 2007 in the case of Stephen Green v City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court and others, which was a private prosecution for blasphemous libel. The court’s primary judgment was that the Theatres Act 1968 and the Broadcasting Act 1990 now already prevent the prosecution of a theatre, the BBC or another broadcaster for blasphemous libel.
Keith Porteous Wood, executive director of the National Secular Society, commented on the Lords' long-awaited action:
The National Secular Society has been campaigning to abolish the blasphemy laws for 140 years. They have an iniquitous history of persecution, and because it is a common law offence with no limit on punishment, they have resulted in executions and imprisonments with hard labour for people who wrote and said things that would, in the modern day, be considered trivial. It is disgraceful that such a relic of religious savagery has survived into the 21st century.
(h/t: Truthdig: British Lawmakers Strike Down Blasphemy Law)
- Garry J. Wise, Toronto
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As mandatory retirement laws in the West fall by the wayside, will the practice of age-discrimination against the very young be next on the chopping block?
A U.K. employment tribunal's decision lends credence to suggestion that it may well be.
Times Online reports today:
A 19-year-old woman who claimed that she was sacked for being too young has been awarded more than £16,000 in compensation after winning a ground-breaking case against her former employer.
It is the first time since age discrimination regulations came into force in October 2006 that they have been properly tested in a case involving young workers.
Leanne Wilkinson, who was then 18, claimed that she suffered age discrimination when she was dismissed from her job as an administrative assistant at Springwell Engineering in Newcastle upon Tyne.
She claimed the company had told her that she was too young for the post and that they needed an older person with more experience.
An employment tribunal ruled in her favour, concluding that she had been discriminated against on the grounds of age. The tribunal said that the company had relied on a “stereotypical assumption that capability equals experience and experience equals older age . . . age was the predominant reason for the decision to dismiss”.
...Miss Wilkinson was awarded £16,081.12, of which £5,000 was for injury to feelings.
- Garry J. Wise, Toronto
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According to a Scotland publication, Scotsman.com:
RADICAL British Jihadist groups are using Facebook and other social networking sites to recruit members and distribute extremist literature.
A private Facebook group called Ahlus Sunnah wal Jama'ah, the name of a successor organisation to the banned extremist group Al Muhajiroun, has been operating since early 2007.
The Facebook group has links posted to extremist literature by the jailed radical preachers Abu Hamza al-Misri and Abu Qutada calling for the waging of armed jihad against the British and American governments. There is also literature demanding the expulsion of any Muslim who votes in elections or "provides assistance" to the 'kuffar', or non-believer.
Five young British Muslims were freed last week after their conviction for downloading and sharing literature from extremist websites was quashed by the Appeal Court. The Lord Chief Justice said there was no proof of terrorist intent. The Home Office is still considering the landmark case, which lawyers for the men say has huge implications for counter-terrorism prosecutions.
- Garry J. Wise, Toronto
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A British firefighter who donated sperm to a lesbian couple whose relationship subsequently ended has been required to pay child support. He claims he was assured at the time he agreed to assist the couple that he would have no financial responsibility for the child.
Times Online reports:
Mr Bathie was approached by the couple five years ago after they entered a civil partnership. At the time he was in a relationship with a woman who had been sterilised and was not planning to have children. He has since married someone else.
Unaware of the legal pitfalls, he was shocked when the Child Support Agency contacted him last November to demand payments because the women had split up. He was made to take a £400 paternity test and his pay was docked.
A spokesman for the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority said that men who donated sperm through licensed fertility clinics were not the legal fathers of any children born as a result. “Men giving out their sperm in any other way, such as via internet arrangements, are legally the father of any children born, with all the responsibilities that carries,” he added.
The CSA said that, unless a child was legally adopted, both biological parents were financially responsible. “The Child Support Agency legislation is not gender or partnership based,” a spokesman said. “Only anonymous sperm donors at licensed centres are exempt from being treated as the legal father. This does not apply to men who donate sperm as part of a personal arrangement.”
UPDATE: December 5, 2007 - Mother says "sperm donor's" story untrue, claims he participated actively in child's life.
Ms Arnold had two children by Mr Bathie – a girl, aged 2, and a boy, 4, who is disabled. She said that the initial arrangement was for him to be a donor only. “I will openly admit to that, but it was him that changed his mind. He wanted to be involved, he wanted to be a dad. Who was I to stop him? I believed it would be beneficial for my children to have their father involved.”
Far from never seeing his daughter, the fireman, from Enfield, North London, was in regular contact and looked after her one weekend every month, Ms Arnold said. “Every time she needed something he was there. He paid for things, he helped me out.”
See: Sperm donor played the role of full-time father, insists lesbian mother.
- Garry J. Wise, Toronto
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A British appeal court learns that bounty hunting is the law of the land in the home of the free.
AMERICA has told Britain that it can “kidnap” British citizens if they are wanted for crimes in the United States.
A senior lawyer for the American government has told the Court of Appeal in London that kidnapping foreign citizens is permissible under American law because the US Supreme Court has sanctioned it.
The admission will alarm the British business community after the case of the so-called NatWest Three, bankers who were extradited to America on fraud charges. More than a dozen other British executives, including senior managers at British Airways and BAE Systems, are under investigation by the US authorities and could face criminal charges in America.
Until now it was commonly assumed that US law permitted kidnapping only in the “extraordinary rendition” of terrorist suspects.
The American government has for the first time made it clear in a British court that the law applies to anyone, British or otherwise, suspected of a crime by Washington.
Legal experts confirmed this weekend that America viewed extradition as just one way of getting foreign suspects back to face trial. Rendition, or kidnapping, dates back to 19th-century bounty hunting and Washington believes it is still legitimate.
...During a hearing last month Lord Justice Moses, one of the Court of Appeal judges, asked Alun Jones QC, representing the US government, about its treatment of Gavin, Tollman’s nephew. Gavin Tollman was the subject of an attempted abduction during a visit to Canada in 2005.
Jones replied that it was acceptable under American law to kidnap people if they were wanted for offences in America. “The United States does have a view about procuring people to its own shores which is not shared,” he said.
He said that if a person was kidnapped by the US authorities in another country and was brought back to face charges in America, no US court could rule that the abduction was illegal and free him: “If you kidnap a person outside the United States and you bring him there, the court has no jurisdiction to refuse — it goes back to bounty hunting days in the 1860s.”
Mr Justice Ouseley, a second judge, challenged Jones to be “honest about [his] position”.
Jones replied: “That is United States law.”
...Legal sources said that under traditional American justice, rendition meant capturing wanted people abroad and bringing them to the United States. The term “extraordinary rendition” was coined in the 1990s for the kidnapping of terror suspects from one foreign country to another for interrogation.
- Garry J. Wise, Toronto
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