UK Law

The prize for the most eye-catching post title of the day goes to Melanie Phillips at the Spectator for ‘Lawfare in Londonistan’: once again, Londonistan is the weakest link in the battle to defend those democratic traditions against attack – both from without and from within.

Alarming news from the Ministry of Love. Random, innocent photographers are being arrested for taking photographs of normal, innocent things like churches and fish and chip shops.

The United Kingdom will have a new Supreme Court in October but the decision to move the Law Lords out of Parliament, where they had sat since 1876, has caused controversy. The UK Supreme Court will be the highest appellate court in all matters under English law, Welsh law and Northern Irish law.

A!er eight years in a Scottish jail, the only man convicted of blowing up Pan Am Flight 103 in 1988 and killing 270 people – the Libyan Abdelbaset Al Megrahi – has been released on compassionate grounds.

Twenty-five Iraqi interpreters are to sue the British government for not protecting them against militias when the militias consider them traitors. Despite a fall in the influence of the militias, many interpreters still fear for their lives.

Jess has written in this week from the UK asking for a bit of help with her A-level project on Spanish and English criminal law. Luckily, I’ve been teaching a Spanish Judge English for the last two years and we’ve commented many of the major differences.

Around 11,000 prisoners are currently serving indeterminate sentences in English jails and it’s very difficult for them to leave because in the prisons where they are locked up, there aren’t enough resources to organise the rehabilitation and training courses they need to complete in order to get out.