Tim Worstall

There is, however, one great benefit from this decision: perhaps for the first time, the judges’ way of thinking has been made absolutely clear. They think it is for the Supreme Court to decide when the elected government doesn’t know what it’s doing, and then to correct its legislative blunders. Lord Brown does not spell [...]

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Via.

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Among the approximately 3,250 prisoners on death row in the US, the vast majority will serve years in solitary and crippling conditions, awaiting execution. Of the 34 states that still kill people, at least 25 hold death row inmates in solitary confinement for 23 hours or more a day. Sensory deprivation is prevalent. On death [...]

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I wonder if a certain female police officer is going to find herself charged with damaging equipment? Assault even?

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This woman’s vying for the Laurie Penny Award. Because this is not solely about stamping out the under-represented but over-reported incidents of violent protest. Taking part in peaceful civil disobedience will become much more frightening as those arrested at protests are dragged through the courts system. Eh? Despite the piecemeal nature of sentencing for those [...]

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I’ve never understood why we allow our print media to support a particular political viewpoint. Words fail.

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But so profoundly unfashionable that no one will say so: Philip Davies, the MP for Shipley, claimed the disabled or those with mental health problems were at a disadvantage because they could not offer to work for less money. Relaxing the law would help some to compete more effectively for jobs in “the real world” [...]

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Perhaps Ed Balls, the Children’s Secretary at the time, should have given Miss Shoesmith more of a chance to put her case (although it isn’t true that she was denied a hearing altogether: she was able to put her arguments to Haringey Council, the body that fired her). But, as Mr Balls said on Friday, [...]

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Martin Kettle that is: Morality and the rule of law should apply on the internet as elsewhere in human conduct. This is absolutely true. What needs to be acknowledged, however, is that Sarkozy is right about the principle. The internet cannot exist in some undiscussable and untouchable dimension of human activity. It is a human [...]

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“The majority of homophobic attacks are never reported,” says the gay-rights campaigner Peter Tatchell. “Low-level assaults could easily be multiplying under the radar. It can be even worse for prominent gay figures like Philip. I myself have been attacked more than 300 times in the past 20 years. As a result, I suffer from permanent [...]

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Well, no, not really, despite the Telegraph leader telling us so. The law protects those we accuse but cannot prove of seeking to do us harm. If we can prove it then we can bang them up: there’s no problem with jailing someone convicted of conspiracy to commit terrorist offences. Either in law or morality. [...]

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Via, a decent court ruling. The case stated raised four questions for consideration by this court. Having analysed the issues, this court considers that the four questions in essence amount to one question: in a case of cash forfeiture does a customs officer have to show that the property seized was obtained through conduct of [...]

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That’s the only possible meaning of this: As part of this, we condemn any politically motivated policing which provokes, intimidates or criminalises protestors. Isn’t it? And/or they support the right of the BNP to march? Or is “any” restricted to those marching for what they approve of?

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It used to be that people who had never been convicted of any crime but that certain people in the government considered dangerous were called “free men.”

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The unprecedented scale of undercover operations used by police to monitor Britain’s political protest movements was laid bare last night after a third police spy was identified by the Guardian. News of the existence of the 44-year-old male officer comes as regulators prepare two separate official inquiries into the activities of this hitherto secret police [...]

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So, you’re off to London to see the sights. Police were said to have found a list of six sites, including the full postal address of the Stock Exchange, Boris Johnson’s London mayoral office and the US embassy. Defendants were seen studying the tower of Big Ben, before inspecting Westminster Abbey, the London Eye and [...]

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Quite lovely to see Guardianistas tying themselves up in knots trying to prove that there are indeed indigenous peoples who do and should have special rights but that Britons are not such. Even if they are indigenous. The distinction seems to be that indigenous people must be an oppressed minority struggling for their rights, not [...]

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You do rather have to decide you know: The European court of human rights last week settled the case of three Irish residents who argued that their wellbeing had been jeopardised by their need to travel abroad in order to secure an abortion. Ireland’s theocratic strictures on terminations are nothing new. The abortionist Mamie Cadden [...]

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A MUSLIM fanatic who torched a wreath of poppies on Armistice Day was given a police guard to protect his home, The Sun can reveal. Taxpayers paid to cover the cost of placing two officers and a patrol car outside the house of Abu Rahin Aziz. The zealot was part of a 40-strong mob who [...]

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Way back in 2006 the then government decided it was going to introduce something called the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Act. This was all about giving Ministers more Henry VIII powers. In effect, a Minister could amend, reform, abolish, any Act they so desired without the consent or leave of Parliament. I dubbed it the [...]

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