“Police officers who took the personal details of a woman ‘kettled’ during a trade union rally in 2011 acted unlawfully, the High Court has ruled.”
BBC News, 18th June 2013
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
“Twenty-one people who occupied a power station for a week have avoided custodial sentences.”
BBC News, 6th June 2013
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
“The Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 has already brought to an end the availability of legal aid across a whole range of areas of law that have direct relevance to the poor. Under cover of generalised claims about opportunistic litigation, the goal has clearly been to remove the capacity for challenge to the implementation (whether lawless or not) of the coalition’s various attacks on benefits. The same legislation also withdrew state support from foreign nationals in prison who are threatened with deportation, as many are – regardless of how long they had been here and how British they are in fact. The idea behind this change was to prevent resistance to removal by showing an infringement of the right to respect for private life in the Human Rights Act (a matter on which government now also intends to legislate separately). In both these cases, the government appears close to accepting that their goal is to prevent meritorious cases getting to court, on the ground that the laws that make them meritorious (human rights legislation; equality law; the common law of procedural fairness) are not laws they like. They have been tempted to remove the litigants rather than the laws, hoping there’ll be less fuss.”
UK Constitutional Law Group, 10th June 2013
Source: www.ukconstitutionallaw.org
“Lawyers waving placards and chanting blocked the road outside the Ministry of Justice on Tuesday evening in protest over proposals to slice a further £220m out of criminal legal aid and remove defendants’ ability to choose a solicitor.”
The Guardian, 4th June 2013
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
“Hundreds, some wearing wigs and gowns, demonstrate against justice secretary’s plans, which they say undermine UK justice.”
The Guardian, 22nd May 2013
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
“A protester arrested at the Dale Farm traveller eviction will receive undisclosed damages after she complained she was left in a police van for too long.”
Daily Telegraph, 23rd April 2013
Source: www.telegraph.co.uk
“The last British resident being held in Guantánamo Bay may never be allowed to return to his family in London because of an alleged ‘secret deal’ between US authorities, Saudi Arabia and the British security services.”
The Guardian, 20th April 2013
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
“There has been widespread speculation that protests will take place during the funeral of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. But what laws will be in force?”
BBC News, 16th April 2013
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
“Campaigners reacted angrily last night after Scotland Yard suggested protesters should consider avoiding Baroness Thatcher’s cortège – because they face arrest under a controversial public order law.”
The Independent, 15th April 2013
Source: www.independent.co.uk
“The High Court has ruled that protesters should be evicted from part of the University of Sussex.”
BBC News, 29th March 2013
Source: www.bbc.co.uk
“Continued occupation as a trespasser could in appropriate circumstances amount to an additional act beyond the initial act of trespass as required by section 68(1) of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 in order to prove an offence of aggravated trespass.”
WLR Daily, 22nd March 2013
Source: www.iclr.co.uk
“Villagers who have spent almost three years blockading an illegal gipsy camp
declared victory after a High Court judge ordered the travellers to leave.”
Daily Telegraph, 27th March 2013
Source: www.telegraph.co.uk
“A protester has been bound over to keep the peace for 12 months after he lunged at a car carrying the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall before the Archbishop of Canterbury’s enthronement.”
The Independent, 22nd March 2013
Source: www.independent.co.uk
“In Catt v ACPO and others; T v Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis and another [2013] EWCA Civ 192, the Court of Appeal considered two appeals regarding the powers of the police to collect and retain personal information about members of the public. Both cases turned on the application of Article 8 of the Convention; in both, the Court held that there had been an interference with the Article 8(1) right to respect for private life, and that the interference was not justified under Article 8(2).”
Panopticon, 20th March 2013
Source: www.panopticonblog.com
“The retention by the police of personal information on an individual stored on a police national database, or the issue of a warning notice against a person accused of harassment and its retention in police records, involved an interference with a person’s right to respect for his private and family life, within the meaning of article 8 of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, and such retention would breach the right unless justified.”
WLR Daily, 14th March 2013
Source: www.iclr.co.uk
“A woman has described her shock after being found guilty of a public order offence for telling David Cameron he had ‘blood on his hands’.”
The Guardian, 16th March 2013
Source: www.guardian.co.uk
“Police face having to rethink their whole strategy for public demonstrations after judges ruled today that the surveillance they placed a peaceful protester under was unlawful.”
The Independent, 14th March 2013
Source: www.independent.co.uk
