The Defence Brief

Mr Bean's home made self-driving  (sort of)  car Because I run London Drink Driving Solicitor and people like to be clever, I am occasionally asked what the legal position is should self-driving cars be released for sale vis-à-vis drink driving.  I assume that a lot of people would like to be able to go out, get drunk and then travel home in their own car without putting themselves or anybody else in danger – nice thought, I like the idea too. What’s the legal position? First, section 5 of the Road Traffic Act 1988 says that a person who drives or attempts to drive a motor vehicle on a road or other public place while the alcohol in the breath, blood or urine exceeds the drink driving limit commits an offence.  It also goes on to say that anybody who is in charge of a motor vehicle with alcohol above the drink driving limit commits an offence.  So, we have two offences, drink driving and being in charge. For the purposes of this exercise we’l...

Who's watching you right now? John Whittingdale, Tory MP and Government Culture Secretary has spoken out about adblocking software saying they are 'modern-day protection racket' and that they present a threat to the continued existence of the newspaper and music industries.  That’s a pretty big claim, but is it true? First, what do we mean by adblockers?  Simply, they are computer programs that run on your computer and prevent websites loading adverts when they load the rest of the webpage.  I would also argue that programs such as Ghostery also fall into the category of adblockers because they can block the tracking software that advertisers use to monitor users web browsing activity and tailor adverts based on that activity.  That’s why if you search for a particular pram you might suddenly notice you start seeing adverts for that pram. In his speech to the Oxford Media Convention, Mr Whittingdale likened the use of adblockers to music copyright ...