Series Break - 7th November 2014

Dear Listeners of Northpod Law and of UK Criminal Law Blog Podcast From time to time, the fates conspire against us all and the absence of our last show of the series and the delay in the start of UKCLBP (as I am now calling it) is testament to this. We don't generally take a series break as you know but we need one at the moment. We have had people moving jobs, I have been beset with Whooping Cough (I know! How very 19th Century of me to get that as an adult) and we think that...

S14E04 - Running Late, Sounding Adequate

The episode that might never have happened is finally here.  You can listen right here. What with Ben being incapacitated, Kirstin being snowed-under and Jonathan having been abducted by aliens (some of this may not be true), a big dent has been made on our otherwise reliable schedule.  We apologise unreservedly. In this week's show, we have a look at R v Creathorne - an interesting case in which the question of how much credit ought to be given for a plea of guilty where the CPS hasn't handed-over the evidence at the time of the first hearing in...

S14E03 - Rights and Wrong'uns

You can listen to this week's show right here. This week's show is about the Tory plan to abolish the Human Rights Act and to put England and Wales (though not Scotland or NI, of course) outside of the direct constraints of International Human Rights law. It's a good job that Ben is still barely croaking otherwise this would no doubt have been an angry rant full of vitriol about our Home Secretary and Lord Chancellor.  Surely Kirstin will be far more calm about it... Of course, you might want to balance the Tory slandering of the Act and...

S14E02 - Corruption

With Ben still suffering from the Dreaded Lurgy and Jonathan being AWOL, Kirstin is left to man the battlements of Northpod Towers this week.  Have a listen right here. With all that is going in at the MoJ (for whom it has not been a good week!), we couldn't let that go by without a mention. But before we get to that, the rather interesting case of Serious Fraud Office v Miltiades Papachristos and Dennis Kerrison.  This case concerns a legal question about amending indictments and contains some rather odd twists and turns. All being well, we might even have...

S14E01 - Power to the Victim

You can listen here! This week we scrabble around in the mud to bring you a frankly minimal offering of law.  It may have been the silly season but the law has (at least in this country) remained aloof and above such matters. Sadly this show was recorded before the Lord Chancellor was defeated in the High Court by criminal solicitors using judicial review - a system Grayling would like to seee abolished - and now we can see why.  He acted illegally.  That didn't stop his press office tweeting (like a petulant child) that it wasn't a...

S13E06 - Tea and Cake

Hear this week's show right here. This is a silly episode to end series 13.  We are doing cake, bourbon and tea.  Yep, we are covering rulings of the tax tribunal and the Advertising Standards Agency.  You might think that this would be a bit dry but no.   We go to town on Tunnocks and get passionate about pyramids. Please don't expect the usual cutting analysis of heavy-weight appeal decisions.  Instead, expect munching and slurping.  And some chortling.   Normal service will be resumed next series! In the meantime, stay subscribed for UK Criminal Law Blog Podcast.  They'll...

S13E05 - The VC Factor

Listen to this week's show right here. In a CBA vice-chair election special, we are joined by the two candidates, Mark Fenhalls QC and Paul Keleher QC. There was no bloodshed in this head-to-head but we think you'll want to hear what both candidates have to say on the wide-ranging topics up for discussion. We cover everything from "The Deal" to the future use of direct action; from how to stop the slide back into the Bar being for the white, male, middle-class to what the future holds for the Bar in light of the reviews. We put some...

S13E04 - Immigration and Impertinence

Listen to this week's show right here. We have swapped Kirstin for Jonathan this week as we take on what must be the two biggest immigration cases of the year, MM and PLP vs Grayling - not their official titles! These cases may be weighty immigration cases but they are important far more broadly as they involve the relationship between the State, Europe and private individuals.  They also demonstrate that politics may be getting in the way of good law-making, not for the first time. Following on from that, we took a look at Re: Ian Stuart West...

S13E03 - Expert Evidence, Unreliable Evidence and Fresh Evidence

Listen to this week's show right here.We have talked about expert witnesses many times over the past 12 series but we have seldom explored exactly what an "expert witness" is, what they do, to whom they are accountable, how they are regulated and how they come to be involved in cases.   This week, we fix that by catching-up with Glen Siddall of Aequitas Forensics, Manchester.  Glen is an expert in digital forensics and he is instructed by "both sides" in criminal proceedings.  We ask him about his work and about recent changes in the world of the expert...

S13E02 - Historic Sexual Offences

Have a listen to this week's show right here. In the light of the recent verdicts and sentence in Rolph Harris' case, Kirstin goes through the Sexual Offences Act 1956, looking at what offences are contained in it and how amendments have affected the law. Given that we are on the subject of how the law changes over the years and that retrospective legislation is dangerous territory, we thought it would be worthwhile to take a peek at the decision of the High Court in Reilly (No.2) as the Government gets a bloody nose for playing dirty with JSA...

S13E01 - Let's Look At That Again

We are back for Series 13 (!) of the podcast and we are raring to go with some law this week.  Many thanks to the good folks at UK Criminal Law Blog Podcast and thanks again to Lyndon Harris for having both Kirstin and Ben on this series.   As always, you can hear this week's show by clicking here. Also, PLEASE RATE/REVIEW US: wherever you subscribe, please take two seconds as we start this series, to give us some stars and a few kind words.  We'd be e'er so obliged.  It helps us get up the search rankings,...

S12E06 - The Results Are In...

The cake and bourbon show is upon us again.  Our 72nd episode can be heard right here. In this week's show, we take a look at Sir Bill Jeffrey's review of independent criminal advocacy in England and Wales.  It may be reopening an old front in the war between barristers and HCAs but the conclusions give considerable grounds for taking stock of the effects of all the reforms over the last 10 years.  They also present a potentially chilling view of the future for anyone who fears change.  Find the full report in the links below - along...

S12E05 - The Schadenfreude of Rampant State Failure

It's NorthPod Law 4 - MoJ and the Home Office 0 as (oh dear) Kirstin Beswick and Jonathan Holt have a lot of fun at the expense of those two ministries - you can Listen Here. First up is the total collapse of a five-handed serious fraud involving the exploitation of members of the public, including rather vulnerable people. And why? Well, because as the MoJ has discovered that if you pay peanuts, sometimes you can't even get monkeys. It doesn't help does it, Mr Grayling, when it's the Prime Minister's brother who's making the application...and doing it...

S12E04 - All Change! No Change!

On this week's show, which you can listen to by clicking these very words, Ben and Kirstin talk their way through the so-called "revolution" in the family courts. It is something of an oddity that reforms that actually do very little in terms of changing the status quo and, instead, assume that lawyers have been doing it wrong for all of this time, should be heralded as a "revolution" by a political judge.  Check out the government hype in the links below. Not content with having a pop at the President of the Family Division's self-congratulation, Ben finds the...

S12E03 - A Rare Thing Indeed!

On this week's show, which you can hear by clicking here, we are joined by lap-dancer-turned-law-student, Vanessa Knowles to talk about how a law student making good money from being very visible online might encounter problems in a future career.  It turns out things are not as bleak as you might think. We talk about how not to deal with the Court of Appeal when it comes to having a pop at a client's previous lawyers and how the Court uses its rarely-wielded power to dismiss a case without a hearing of any sort. We look at a...

S12E02 - The New Way(a)

The Way(a) to listen is to click here! Enough with the awful title and dreadful pun - is it a pun?  This week we transport you to the sunny shores of Cape Town via a fascinating interview with barrister David Pojur, telling us all about the legal system that's currently trying Oscar Pistorius. We come closer to home although no further from scandalous trials to look at the Nigel Evans trial in Preston.  Ben's promised link to the Code for Crown Prosecutors is here. Kirstin discusses Re G a family case with wider importance to absent fathers and...

S12E01 - Proposals

Listen Here Welcome back.  It's the glorious Twelfth! In week one, we talk to Family Barrister Joe Lynch about the proposed changes to the child cruelty laws to add in emotional abuse.  Should it be done?  Can it be done?  How's it done in the rest of the world?  The Action for Children report can be found here We exclusively reveal how much the Lord Chancellor's car costs - STOP PRESS!! And we confuse you completely with the proposed theft sentencing guidelines - don't forget to engage with the consultation to try at least to make it less...

S11E06 - Between The Rock and a Hard Place

Listen to this week's show here. On this week's show, John Cooper QC joins our roving reporter, Keith Jones in Gibraltar to talk about the law and the Bar in one of Britain's far-flung outposts. A little closer to home, we look at what happens when you cough to something whilst in custody and when that sort of confession will not be allowed in to evidence. We take a glance over fracking near Northpod Towers and celebs on trial near our local cobbles. Also, a look at sentencing for assisting a suicide by buying the petrol used.  The rather...

S11E05 - Words, Words, Words

This week we carry on the tradition of the series in that we're a member of the usual team short. It's Ben on this occasion. He'll be back next week, I'm sure.  Listen Here   Matters under consideration are – what knowingly means when it comes to the environment; when a crime under the Dangerous Dogs Act is not a crime at all (and it's not the same as the last one); when parking is not parking and when a solicitor can hang on to papers and when he has to pass them on.  It's all very cutting edge...

S11E04 - Of Interest to the Public

Ben and Jonathan get to grips with some matters of public importance this week's show.  First up is a look at the guidance (in force from February 2014) on the publication of decisions of the family courts and the Court of Protection.  There are some interesting questions raised about how this is going to work and who is paying for it.   Either way, you'll have to know about this if you work in either of these areas of law and the public may well find the reality of these cases far more challenging than the abstract way...