Busted

As you may recall from my previous post "A Case of Privilege" there was a ruling last year in the Chaytor case on the abuse by some MPs of Parliament’s system of expenses, which surfaced spectacularly in 2009. In the latest episode in this saga at the start of this year David Chaytor, a former Labour MP, was sentenced to 18 months in prison for false accounting. On January 11th it was the turn of Eric Illsley, who kept his seat at the last general election, to appear before a judge. He pleaded guilty to fraudulently claiming £14,000 in expenses associated with a second home, and later announced his resignation from Parliament. He is likely to face jail as well. Four other politicians—two ex-MPs and two peers—have been charged with similar offences, and the police are investigating several others. Nice to see the wheels of law churning and catching a few guilty parties.

A Matter of Perspective

I came across an really thought provoking book last night as I was wandering around the internet: The Legal Analyst - A Toolkit for Thinking about the Law by Ward Farnsworth. I've only read to the second chapter so far but what I've read really helps me to conceptualize things. One great point is to view the law through the perspectives of ex ante and ex post. The ex post perspective involves looking back at a disaster or other event after it has occurred and deciding what to do about it or how to clean it up. The second perspective, ex ante, involves looking forward and asking what effects the decision about this case will have in the future —on parties who are entering similar situations and haven’t yet decided what to do, and whose choices may be influenced by the consequences the law says will follow from them.

Another Milestone

When was the last time that you actually saw a milestone? I always find them quite interesting actually, almost like Stonehenge to be honest. A quaint relic of a time gone by, weathered by the elements yet still visible. Perhaps not as much of a mystery as the Wiltshire stones but still intriguing. At least to me.

In any event today I reached another milestone in my quest for the LLB. I stopped by my local examination centre this morning to get their sign off on my papers to sit my exams in the spring and I have just posted them to the university. In a few more days I can expect a much more visible sign when the fee for the exams is deducted from my account.

Slightly behind where I wanted to be at this point but I will be putting my nose to the grindstone over the next few months so keep the bandages handy...

Happy New Year

Big apologies for the slide in my number of postings at the end of last year. I am going to use the excuse that I was deep deep in studying and could not even be bothered to lift my nose out of the books to eat and drink much less to post a few words here. I will leave it up to you to decide whether this is true or not but I am going to stick with it...

I have actually made a bit of progess in the past couple of months especially in criminal law but there is a strange thing which is slowing me down - a lack of index cards. Sadly it is impossible to get index cards where I live (hard to believe I know but seemingly true). I wanted to use them to make flash cards to study the huge number of accumulating cases. Somehow I got really fixated on this issue and searched high and low for index cards but was unable to find them in any shop or office supply store. Neither was Santa clever enough to find them. So I am left to my own devices to find an old fashioned means to study the cases. Open to suggestions so if you have any good tips please write back and let me know.

Fast and furious

One thing which strikes me as I study the law is the amazing increase in the number of laws and regulations. However even more than this, I am amazed by the overall fast and furious pace of change in the entire legal system. I can only imagine what it must have been like to study the law back in the early eighties as opposed to now. To be sure, common law traces its roots back hundreds of years but without a doubt the last thirty years has seen an exponential growth in the legal web which ensnares us. Not only does statute after statute fly out of the halls of parliament, but the amount of delegated legislation expands so rapidly one needs to be a specialist to keep up. Sadly it seems to me that the expanding use of laws and regulations pushes personal freedom ever further and further into a small corner. As parliaments feel the need to act to solve all of the woes of humanity, individuals seem to slowly but surely lose their freedom to act. Power is continually funneled down from the omnipotent lawmaking body into the hands of ministries, bureaucrats and unelected officials, many of whom have the power to act arbitrarily. What does the future hold if we keep up at this pace? Will there be anything left which is not legistlated or prescribed?

Cut to the bone

The Con-Lib government yesterday came out with their long awaited and well feared comprehensive spending review. As expected, there was blood everywhere from the deep cuts imposed over the next several years. Perhaps nowhere were these as keenly felt as in the Ministry of Justice where budget savings are expected of over 25%. Obviously 25% saving cannot be achieved with 'economies of scale' or 'cutting the fat'. To reduce costs by 25% the Ministry is expected to close prisons, put less people in prison, slash legal aid, close courts, cut staff, reduce the CPS, put those already in prison out to work and sell off property. All of these steps might just bring them close to meeting their savings target. One of the most interesting comments however came from Ken Clark the Lord Chancellor who said that it is nigh upon impossible to rehabilitate a person who is sentenced to prison for under a year. Obviously the notion is that with the cost of every one person in jail to the taxpayer of about 40,000 pound a year it is better to have lesser offenses dealt with by income generating fines or some form of community service. More importantly perhaps is the acknowledgement that short term prison sentences are far more retributive in nature than rehabilitative. Personally, I believe the punishment should have a strong retributive aspect, if not for deterrence, then for the mere fact that criminal behavior should be punished. However maybe some creative thinking is involved in seeing what actually might be the best punishment for those convicted of crime. I will give some thought to it and should you have any suggestions I would love to hear them…

How good are you?

I seem to be bumping my nose against this question this week. Despite all the studying and all the essay writing, I still don't really know how good my performance is while studying the LLB. Am I doing work which is good enough for a First? An Upper Second? Hard for me to really judge. I don't think that my fellow students have the necessary skills either to give my work a proper grade. What's left then? To hope for the best and just keep on giving it my all? To splash out and pay to have some of my work reviewed by a professional? Usually, one is able to get feedback from professors in order to gauge how things are going. They are experts in pointing out what areas are strong and where improvements need to be made, however in this LLB course I do not have teachers whom I can draw upon. I am on my own. Normally this would not be too much of a problem, and I doubt seriously that I would actually fail a course (ha! I am sure that such arrogance will come back to haunt me). However the problem is that the access to the legal profession seems to narrow significantly for those with a 2.2 or below. To be sure, one can break into the profession even with a pass I suppose but the going is quite tough and the 'rebuttable presumption' is that you are not good enough for the law. So this rambling takes me back to the initial question - how good am I? I suppose the only way is to get out there and prove it. To be as active and involved as possible, interested and actively learning. To dive into competitions when I can find them and to get feedback as much as I can from others and be open to what they are saying. Hopefully at least with all of these things I will find that I am good enough for myself.