On 11 October 2016 the IPB passed the report stage , which leaves only the third reading before royal assent. It is likely to become law in January 2017. The Bill is an unprecedented legislative assault on privacy. Although it is welcome in that it seeks to regulate what the authorities have been doing anyway without any formal legal basis , it contains incredibly far-reaching powers with insufficient oversight.…
8 Dec 2016
This paper considers some of the obligations and powers under which the State comes to investigate deaths , incidents of serious harm and abuse , and other forms of wrongdoing. These obligations and powers can , in limited circumstances , be used in judicial review proceedings to challenge decisions of Government and other public authorities on whether to conduct an investigation , and , if so , what form of investigation is required…
The introduction of the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (“DoLSâ€) to the MCA 2005 on 1 April 2009 imposed a statutory responsibility on local authorities to oversee and operate a scheme to lawfully deprive the liberty of adults who lack the capacity to consent to arrangements made for their care or treatment in either hospitals or care home in their own best interests.…
17 Nov 2016
There have been rapid technological developments and the scale of data sharing and collection has increased dramatically. Intelligent technology allows private and state use of personal data on an unprecedented scale. There is a wide variation in national implementation of Directive 95/46/EC , and a need to do away with legal uncertainty and current costly fragmentation.…
The next six years marks out the most ambitious period of change since the Judicature Acts of the 1870s. The aim that the Lord Chief Justice and I have agreed with the Lord Chancellor is quite simply to strengthen the rule of law. The reform programme that was announced this last month is a breathtaking £1bn investment project.…
11 Nov 2016
The number and diversity of JR cases is now such that a review of the year can only hope to cover a small sample of the Administrative Court’s workload. The selection of cases here (from September 2015 to August 2016) necessarily reflects our personal choice , and no doubt there are many others that could have been included. We have each picked three cases. They are summarised in chronological order.…
2 Nov 2016
There was so much background reading and watching referenced in our ‘By Public Demand! Inquiries , Investigations and the Law’ conference on 21st April 2016 that we asked contributors to recommend follow up reading and watching.…
8 Aug 2016
These are a set of slides to accompany a presentation by Emma Dowden-Teale , Bates Wells Braithwaite & Rhiannon Jones , Lester Morrill Solicitors for PLP’s North conferecne , 14 July 2016.
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3 Aug 2016
This paper considers the opportunities for legal redress under the Human Rights Act 1998 (“HRAâ€) where police fail to carry out their investigative responsibilities. The main focus is on the claims available to victims of serious crimes against the person. However , I also examine briefly the position of those accused of crimes who experience delay in their exoneration as a result of incompetent investigation.…
24 Jun 2016
In the last 20 years or so Parliament has provided a rash of purportedly civil remedies to address various types of nuisance or anti-social behaviour. This began with housing ASB injunctions under the Housing Act 1996 which were significantly extended by the Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003 , the ASBO of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 which whilst originally a stand alone civil remedy became most used after sentencing from criminal offences that constituted such behaviour , to follow have been gang related violence (and now drug dealing) injunctions and there have been or are a number of others such as football banning orders.…
15 Jul 2016
This presentation looks at the core duties to investigate , identify , and protect; the source of those duties; and their application in situations where the police and the Home Office are most likely to come into contact with victims – enforcement action , immigration crime raids , police stations , prisons , detention centres , screening , immigration procedures , and visa posts.…
Mid-Staffordshire , Morecambe Bay , Winterbourne View , Southern Health. Sadly the NHS is far from immune from preventable deaths , individual and systemic abuse , and deficient investigations into its own failings. The need for effective systems that will prevent death and serious harm , protective duties that require staff to take operational measures to protect those in their care , and robust , searching investigations into deaths and incidents of mistreatment are needed in healthcare and clinical settings now more than ever.…