@uncivil-s.bsky.social
Barrister, ex-public sector, semi-demi-retired, various legal part time jobs. Legal interests public law, housing and some property, crime, statutes, and most other things. Lives Birmingham, works in a 150/mile 270 degree crescent therefrom. Has sons.
The core problem with the Palestinian Action proscription is that there is a reasonable argument that it is a terrorist organisation *according to the 2000 Act definition* of terrorism. It’s just that that definition is stupidly wide.
November 26, 2025 at 10:54 PM
The core problem with the Palestinian Action proscription is that there is a reasonable argument that it is a terrorist organisation *according to the 2000 Act definition* of terrorism. It’s just that that definition is stupidly wide.
Looking at his timeline, @stephenkb.bsky.social has the patience of a saint, but a somewhat acerbic saint.
November 26, 2025 at 10:18 PM
Looking at his timeline, @stephenkb.bsky.social has the patience of a saint, but a somewhat acerbic saint.
I’m not a jury-worshipper, and it seems likely that professional judges will (often) be better at fact-finding. But that the system has to cope with the input of non-professionals does provide imp safeguards, well beyond jury nullification. Above all, it conditions prosecution decision making.
November 26, 2025 at 4:39 PM
I’m not a jury-worshipper, and it seems likely that professional judges will (often) be better at fact-finding. But that the system has to cope with the input of non-professionals does provide imp safeguards, well beyond jury nullification. Above all, it conditions prosecution decision making.
Reposted
Why the two-child limit has to go, in a chart.
November 25, 2025 at 4:28 PM
Why the two-child limit has to go, in a chart.
Reposted
Meanwhile... we could have seen this coming:
Medical bodies warn that hostility towards migrants is behind a 26% rise in departures that imperils NHS
> Overseas-trained doctors leaving the UK in record numbers
www.theguardian.com/society/2025...
Medical bodies warn that hostility towards migrants is behind a 26% rise in departures that imperils NHS
> Overseas-trained doctors leaving the UK in record numbers
www.theguardian.com/society/2025...
Overseas-trained doctors leaving the UK in record numbers
Medical bodies warn that hostility towards migrants is behind a 26% rise in departures last year that imperils NHS
www.theguardian.com
November 21, 2025 at 9:09 AM
Meanwhile... we could have seen this coming:
Medical bodies warn that hostility towards migrants is behind a 26% rise in departures that imperils NHS
> Overseas-trained doctors leaving the UK in record numbers
www.theguardian.com/society/2025...
Medical bodies warn that hostility towards migrants is behind a 26% rise in departures that imperils NHS
> Overseas-trained doctors leaving the UK in record numbers
www.theguardian.com/society/2025...
I agree with the criticisms; but this BBC report looks a bit garbled. It looks like what the Gov means is automatic bench trials for offences up to 5 years max, and a discretion for judges to order them in some other cases (complex fraud et)? Quite how interests of justice test comes in isn’t clear.
Imagine coming up with a proposal so stupid, so unworkable, so thoughtless, that it makes Robert Jenrick look sane by comparison.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Jury trials could be scrapped except in most serious cases
Only cases of alleged murder, rape or manslaughter will be decided by a jury under new proposals to cut court backlogs.
www.bbc.co.uk
November 25, 2025 at 6:00 PM
I agree with the criticisms; but this BBC report looks a bit garbled. It looks like what the Gov means is automatic bench trials for offences up to 5 years max, and a discretion for judges to order them in some other cases (complex fraud et)? Quite how interests of justice test comes in isn’t clear.
But, in the Turkish language, what was the name of the country when we called it “Turkey” in English?
Question for those way more knowledge than I
If Turkey changed its name why does it keep being called Turkey by news agencies instead of Türkiye
Even the AP often does it
If Turkey changed its name why does it keep being called Turkey by news agencies instead of Türkiye
Even the AP often does it
November 25, 2025 at 3:07 PM
But, in the Turkish language, what was the name of the country when we called it “Turkey” in English?
I’m beginning to think that when I say “I quite like [a food]”, other people say ”I don’t like [that food]”, and when I say “I don’t mind [another food]“, you all say “God, I can’t stand [the second food], how could anyone possibly like it, it’s utterly awful”.
November 25, 2025 at 2:54 PM
I’m beginning to think that when I say “I quite like [a food]”, other people say ”I don’t like [that food]”, and when I say “I don’t mind [another food]“, you all say “God, I can’t stand [the second food], how could anyone possibly like it, it’s utterly awful”.
“Not with intent” is pretty dashed odd. I mean, the phonemes to make up those words came together in that order by accident?
Asked again and again whether he ever racially abused his fellow pupils, as 20 people at his old school have now said he did, Nigel Farage will only say that he never did so in a "hurtful way" or "with intent"
November 25, 2025 at 2:41 PM
“Not with intent” is pretty dashed odd. I mean, the phonemes to make up those words came together in that order by accident?
Curry’s, I’m flattered to announce, have decided I am a baron.
November 25, 2025 at 2:14 PM
Curry’s, I’m flattered to announce, have decided I am a baron.
If Ukr manage to manoeuvre the Russians into rejecting the “peace plan”, that would be some achievement.
Scoop @financialtimes.com: Under the US-Ukraine deal, Kyiv agreed to cap the size of its army at 800,000, according to senior officials who say they're pleased with the plan. Points left are territorial matters and security guarantees, which are TBD by Zelensky and Trump. www.ft.com/content/b0d9...
Russia signals it could reject modified US peace plan for Ukraine
Foreign minister Sergei Lavrov suggests Moscow would walk away from proposal that differs substantially from Alaska talks
www.ft.com
November 25, 2025 at 1:36 PM
If Ukr manage to manoeuvre the Russians into rejecting the “peace plan”, that would be some achievement.
Jesus wept. We are a bit lost already if this happens.
I wish I didn’t have to share this. But the BBC has decided to censor my first Reith Lecture.
They deleted the line in which I describe Donald Trump as “the most openly corrupt president in American history.” /1
They deleted the line in which I describe Donald Trump as “the most openly corrupt president in American history.” /1
November 25, 2025 at 9:58 AM
Jesus wept. We are a bit lost already if this happens.
Reposted
On the ‘it’s pretentious to style yourself Dr’ debate – sure, it probably is, but on the other hand the titles and the robes are just about the only fun part left in academia, and I’m not willing to cede them to the grey, managerial fun police just yet. Embrace the pomposity.
November 24, 2025 at 5:21 PM
On the ‘it’s pretentious to style yourself Dr’ debate – sure, it probably is, but on the other hand the titles and the robes are just about the only fun part left in academia, and I’m not willing to cede them to the grey, managerial fun police just yet. Embrace the pomposity.
Grimly comic, aftwr successive Governments, including this one, have smashed UK’s HE international offering, the collapse of which is bringing universities to the brink of insolvency.
With Rachel Reeves reportedly set to apply a new tax on tuition fees paid by overseas students, most Britons support such a move at the previously mooted level of 6%
Support: 57%
Oppose: 18%
yougov.co.uk/topics/socie...
Support: 57%
Oppose: 18%
yougov.co.uk/topics/socie...
November 24, 2025 at 6:52 PM
Grimly comic, aftwr successive Governments, including this one, have smashed UK’s HE international offering, the collapse of which is bringing universities to the brink of insolvency.
It’s quite difficult to build an ugly ship, but the modern cruise industry excels at it.
November 24, 2025 at 7:59 AM
It’s quite difficult to build an ugly ship, but the modern cruise industry excels at it.
I find this quite reassuring.
Congratulations to British fascists, who have quite thoroughly retoxified their own favourite symbols in just a few months, just by association with them.
November 22, 2025 at 7:00 PM
I find this quite reassuring.
Ordered a Durian cheesecake at a Japanese restaurant in Bristol. I had a vague sense of the Durian’s mixed reputation, and thought it worth a try. My advice is DON’T MAKE MY MISTAKE.
November 22, 2025 at 4:07 PM
Ordered a Durian cheesecake at a Japanese restaurant in Bristol. I had a vague sense of the Durian’s mixed reputation, and thought it worth a try. My advice is DON’T MAKE MY MISTAKE.
I thought, when I held my nose and voted Labour last time, that the division had to be between racist Reform populism and the rest, a popular front. Now it (very nearly, almost) looks like Labour is on the side of the racists.
November 21, 2025 at 11:15 AM
I thought, when I held my nose and voted Labour last time, that the division had to be between racist Reform populism and the rest, a popular front. Now it (very nearly, almost) looks like Labour is on the side of the racists.
Reposted
The demonisation of asylum seekers has to stop.
@tajali1.bsky.social: "Some of the rhetoric around asylum seekers is dangerous."
"And what we're seeing now is racist violence, not just directed at asylum seekers, but ethnic minority communities across the country."
@tajali1.bsky.social: "Some of the rhetoric around asylum seekers is dangerous."
"And what we're seeing now is racist violence, not just directed at asylum seekers, but ethnic minority communities across the country."
November 20, 2025 at 1:10 PM
The demonisation of asylum seekers has to stop.
@tajali1.bsky.social: "Some of the rhetoric around asylum seekers is dangerous."
"And what we're seeing now is racist violence, not just directed at asylum seekers, but ethnic minority communities across the country."
@tajali1.bsky.social: "Some of the rhetoric around asylum seekers is dangerous."
"And what we're seeing now is racist violence, not just directed at asylum seekers, but ethnic minority communities across the country."
"Greeks living in Afghanistan were Buddhist 500 years before China and a thousand years before Southeast Asia" is one of those things that sounds made up but is in fact true
November 20, 2025 at 8:08 PM
Reposted
I have zero tolerance for the “well, I guess we have no choice with immigrants but to deport them or lock them up if the paperwork goes wrong”
November 20, 2025 at 5:30 PM
I have zero tolerance for the “well, I guess we have no choice with immigrants but to deport them or lock them up if the paperwork goes wrong”
Reposted
…using the pandemic as a springboard to turn ppl against even the routine childhood ones we’ve had for years, Trump airily agreeing - I cannot imagine how that feels. Vaccine development& rollout is the one thing we did really, really well & the one thing we now apparently want to wreck?
November 20, 2025 at 5:54 PM
…using the pandemic as a springboard to turn ppl against even the routine childhood ones we’ve had for years, Trump airily agreeing - I cannot imagine how that feels. Vaccine development& rollout is the one thing we did really, really well & the one thing we now apparently want to wreck?
Reposted
The Covid inquiry’s findings are shocking but unsurprising now, so the main thing it left me thinking is that without a vaccine we wd’ve been utterly screwed. & if you worked round the clock to make a thing that saved millions of lives globally, to see that legacy trashed by anti-vaxxers…
November 20, 2025 at 5:50 PM
The Covid inquiry’s findings are shocking but unsurprising now, so the main thing it left me thinking is that without a vaccine we wd’ve been utterly screwed. & if you worked round the clock to make a thing that saved millions of lives globally, to see that legacy trashed by anti-vaxxers…
It is, of course, an absolute scandal that serious allegations of crime can take four years to get to trial after being sent to the Crown Court. But HOW DID THIS STATE OF AFFAIRS COME ABOUT, FFS?
If today’s proposal to curtail jury trials goes ahead, it should only be as an emergency measure with an end date.
More details on the proposal here: www.theguardian.com/law/2025/nov... (3/3)
More details on the proposal here: www.theguardian.com/law/2025/nov... (3/3)
MoJ to remove right to trial by jury for thousands of cases in controversial overhaul
Exclusive: Courts minister says change needed to stop criminals opting for juries to delay cases, sometimes by years, and clear huge backlog
www.theguardian.com
November 20, 2025 at 5:04 PM
It is, of course, an absolute scandal that serious allegations of crime can take four years to get to trial after being sent to the Crown Court. But HOW DID THIS STATE OF AFFAIRS COME ABOUT, FFS?
Reposted
In the foreword to settlement consultation, the Home Secretary tells us that "My father came here in the early 1970s, and my mother a little less than a decade later."
November 20, 2025 at 4:51 PM
In the foreword to settlement consultation, the Home Secretary tells us that "My father came here in the early 1970s, and my mother a little less than a decade later."