The Defence Brief

Ben McKenzie & friend (no relation to the pseudo-lawyers) I appear to be in a state of perpetual shock and disbelief this week and the Legal Services Board have done nothing to help me out of that state. Yesterday morning they responded to the Judicial Executive Board’s consultation on the approach courts should take to McKenzie Friends. What is a McKenzie Friend? I can do no better than the definition given by RobinSpon-Smith of 1 Hare Court so I shan’t try: “A McKenzie friend is somebody who accompanies a litigant in person to a court hearing for the purpose of assisting him in such matters as taking notes, helping to organise the documents, and quietly making suggestions – for example as to questions to put to a witness. Although usually a non-lawyer, the McKenzie friend should not be thought of as a species of lay advocate and has no right to address the court.” Originally, a McKenzie Friend was literally a friend of a litigant in person who could as...

Drug pusher Back in June 2015, I wrote about the proposed ban on psychoactive drugs and, being the pessimistic old fart I am, I predicted it would be a dogs dinner if it were ever introduced. I must report that I was wrong. The Act is not a dogs dinner – feeding your dog on food as badly contaminated as the Psychoactive Substances Act 2016 would probably kill it. It gets off to a bad start for me with section 1, “Overview”. This section literally tells you what the other sections say – it’s pointless and reads like the sort introduction a 14 year old might put at the start of an essay. Section 2 weirdly defines the meaning of psychoactive substance, useful but this sort of thing used to go in the interpretation section of an act – in fact it does also appear in the interpretation section with a reference that we should go back to section 2. Oh well, I’m just being fussy now – let’s look at what a psychoactive substance is rather than criticise layout. ...

Aghh Michael Gove's coming... delete, delete, delete Last year three judges were sacked and one resigned after being caught viewing pornography at work. There was no suggestion that this interfered with their judicial office or any cases that they were hearing. It all happened in private in their own offices and appears to have been detected only because the Ministry of Justice audited computer use by employees. It appears that none of this was regular and, in some cases, occurred on just one or two occasions. Two of the men were full time judges while the other two were part-timers, which usually means they are still in practice as lawyers when not sitting as a judge. Staff viewing non-work related websites, including pornography, during work hours is a problem for all employers. When I had employees if I’d sacked everyone who looked at porn once or twice I doubt there would have been anybody left. If I sacked everybody who looked at non-work websites jus...