Sentencing and the Riots

The defendants accused of riot related offences are experiencing 'the full force of the law.' The Bail Act seems no longer to apply and immediate custody or committal for sentence to the Crown court is the norm. On a cost benefit basis, this appears to lack thought. Prisons cost a lot of money - it's far better to impose suspended sentence (to act as a deterrent to with regards to future behaviour) coupled with a community penalty (curfew and/or community punishment.) But practicality was never the strong point of thieves or Magistrates!

Teams of riot police smashing down doors to extract some retribution may look 'tough,' but is another step down in the relationship with 'youth,' emotion not the best driver of action.

You couldn't make it up

Even the case hardened can be amazed by the facts of the case reports. R.v. Maxwell (Paul) the Supreme Court 29th July 2011.

Mr. Chapman was the main prosecution witness in the case of robbery and murder. The case report says 'the police has systematically misled the Court, the Crown Prosecution Service and Counsel by concealing and lying about a variety of benefits received by Chapman and his family. These included not only financial rewards, but also visits to brothels and permission to consume drugs in Police company.'

London Weighting

We are the consultation period for the Funding Order which will abolish London Weighting in Magistrates Courts cases for defence solicitors. In researching the background to this arbitrary cut it has become clear that defence solicitors we are now paid less than in 1991. The rate then for preparation was £44.50 per hour. the rate from October 2011 will be £49.70 per hour, but in 1991 travel and waiting time was paid in addition. Unbelievable!

The slow death of legal aid

We've launched our new website at a time of an appalling assault on publicly funded legal services.

Cutting £350m from the legal aid budget is reckless and will have terrible consequences. More than 10 years of cuts have already eroded services and what will survive remains an open and depressing question.

If a disabled parent cannot access welfare benefit and housing advice, no one knows, as the person and the problem are invisible. There is no one to articulate the connection between a lack of advice and legal aid to the later visible costs of a child taken into care or a lost home.

Short sighted, stupid, discriminatory and outrageous; all these words are appropriate descriptions of Legal Aid policy.

On a cultural note, I recommend 'A Year in the Death of Ricardo Ries' by Jose Sarramago, a brilliant novel set in 1930's Portugal in the period of the rise of fascism, the political consequences of an earlier period of deflation.