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Neil Herron: Will the Terrorism Bill ‘free’ the Metric Martyrs?

Neil Herron:Will the Terrorism Bill ‘free’ the Metric Martyrs?

Press Release: Immediate
Metric Martyrs Defence Fund
12 noon 24th February, 2005

” Will the Terrorism Bill ‘free’ the Metric Martyrs?”

The Government is trampling over the Rights and Liberties of the People…with an unforseen consequence.
Where can liberty turn?
Charles Clarke, a politician and not a judge, is now to make lawful whatever he says is lawful…However,

“NO FREEMAN shall be arrested or detained in prison or deprived of his or outlawed or exiled or in any way molested . . . except by the judgment of his peers.”
Magna Carta, 1215.

If we reference back to Section 62 and 63 of Lord Justice Laws’ Judgment at the Supreme Court of Judicature (Queen’s Bench Division) February 18th 2002, commonly known as the ‘Metric Martyrs’ Judgment (full Judgment here ) we can see…I paraphrase but, in essence…

“We should recognise a hierarchy of Acts of Parliament: as it were “ordinary” statutes and “constitutional statutes”. The special status of constitutional statutes follows the special status of constitutional rights. Examples are the Magna Carta, Bill of Rights 1689 … Ordinary statutes may be impliedly repealed. Constitutional statutes may not…”

Therefore, the Prevention of Terrorism Bill in order to go through Parliament must expressly repeal the relevant section of Magna Carta otherwise, according to the precedent set by Laws, there is no repeal, so no-one can be held or imprisoned without an appearance before a court.
Magna Carta (a ‘constitutional statute’ cannot be repealed by the Prevention of Terrorism Bill, an ‘ordinary’ statute). To debate Magna Carta before the full house and expose the fact that it is every British citizen who will be deprived of a fundamental right is not what the Government will wish to do.

This thrusts the Metric Martyrs right back into the spotlight because we are currently using Lord Justice Laws Judgment against ‘fines and penalties’ imposed by ‘administrative bodies’…unlawful if we apply the Laws Judgment because there is no express repeal of the relevant section of the Bill of Rights 1689 (a ‘constitutional statute) which states:

“That all grants and promises of fines and forfeitures of particular persons before conviction are illegal and void”

which would be required for the ‘ordinary’ statute (such as the Road Traffic Act 1991 which ‘decriminalised’ Parking offences) to have force in law. (Press report here)

Metric Martyrs Campaign Director, Neil Herron states, “Whichever route the Government wishes to proceed, one of the two must fall. Either the Metric Martyrs Judgment is correct which will have the effect of no imprisonment of suspected terrorists without trial, and the effect that all ‘administrative ‘fines and penalties ( such as decriminalised parking tickets, late payment penalties by the Inland Revenue and SORN notices by the DVLA) are unlawful; or the Metric Martyrs’ convictions are unsafe. Either way, the Government are backing themselves up a very tight alley and are playing for very, very high stakes the implications of which they have not even considered as they stumble from one constitutional crisis to the next.”

Tim Worstall does a good job undermining Tony’s confused arguments.

Tim Worstall

The Dear Leader on Liberty.

The Maximum Tone has spoken on the subject of Civil Liberties. Somewhat confused I fear:

I have absolutely no doubt about the main duty of any prime minister: it is to do everything possible to protect the security of our nation and its citizens.

Err, no. You’re supposed to be protecting the freedoms and liberties of the nation and its citizens. The security of is a sub-set, only one amongst a number of things that make up the whole.

The Law Lords are the highest court in the land.

Only in the most technical sense, that they are the highest court that sits in this land. Come along laddie, your wife makes a fortune out of pointing out that there are at least two European Courts which can over ride the Law Lords.

These measures have the support of our police chiefs and our security forces. Indeed, they were drawn up with their assistance.

Just what worries us. Quis custodiet ipsos custodies? In our system, the courts, juries, Habeus Corpus and all the rest.

I reject completely the allegation that this is a fundamental attack on long-standing civil liberties.

Your rejection does not change the self evident truth that it is such an attack.

We have to balance protection for the public from terrorism with safeguarding civil liberties. But there is no greater civil liberty than to live free from terrorist attack.

Indeed, one must balance. The greatest civil liberty is to live free, something that to my mind at least includes the fact that one cannot be deprived of liberty just because some politician says so.

Ben Frankiln said it some years ago:

They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security.

But then that’s entirely too American a thought for the modern Europe, eh Prime Minister?

The imperious thought process of Europhiles

According to Europhiles and the EU political system, we the people cannot be allowed democracy, because we would not know what to do with it, and would probably vote the wrong way. We do not understand what is good for us, so we must have a paternalistic government to make decisions for us and look after us, just in case we stray from their predetermined path toward human enlightenment and the betterment of society.

Of course anyone who should raise a voice in protest at theses autocratic utterances are churlishly attacking the benevolence of our rulers, because they go about the place undermining the very society that is being built in our names, they must be lacking in intelligence and understanding, which merely proves the case.

Janet Daley in the Telegraph looks at the difference between the American ideals of Democracy and that which is laughingly passed of as Democracy in Europe.

Better to make your cynical peace with the worst aspects of human nature than to pretend that free men will always choose good over evil. Much better to make a mutually profitable trade-off behind the scenes than to expose political decisions to the popular will. What evidence is there that the people actually know what is best for them? Most charitably, the European philosophy of government - shortly to be permanently installed under the EU constitution - is paternalistic. At worst, it is arrogant and authoritarian.

But whatever it is, it no longer has a belief in real democracy of the kind that Americans recognise - government of the people, by the people and for the people - at its heart.

The people - with nothing but the raw franchise - will never be allowed to run amok again. Europeans cannot be trusted to govern themselves. Their affairs will be administered by an EU oligarchy.

As I have said before all dictatorial systems of government claim that the state know best and they are all equally wrong.

So the Bill of Rights is an ancient act that has no relevance? As it is still statue law, it can still be used to question the policies of government in our courts. Knowing this, when faced with the threat of this 1688/9 act government and local authorities tend to quietly back off, they do not want people to be generally aware that they still have basic rights that government cannot ignore.

The simple fact that the Bill of Rights says that no one may be punished unless they have been found guilty in a court means that all automatic fines are in fact in contravention of our rights. Just for a moment imagine the chaos that would follow if a large proportion of parking fines were not paid because people demanded their day in court, there is no argument that local authorities can make it illegal to park in an area, but what they cannot do is to demand that you pay a fine without being convicted of the offence of illegal parking. Nor can the Inland Revenue demand that you automatically pay a fine for late delivery of your tax return.

If on the other hand government were to argue, relying on the concept that one parliament may not bind a future parliament, (which concept itself is subject to question, because it was introduced as an understanding by parliament after the Bill of Rights) that in fact their later laws did repeal the Bill of Rights this goes against the judgement in the metric martyrs case;

Lord Justice Laws (Supreme Court of Judicature February 18th 2002) stated:
“The special status of constitutional statutes follows the special status of constitutional rights. Examples are the Magna Carta, the Bill of Rights 1689….”
“Ordinary statutes may be impliedly repealed. Constitutional statutes may not.”

So unless these later acts specifically say they are repealing the Bill of Rights they can not be accepted as doing so, if the government wish to argue the opposite then the metric martyrs simply could not be guilty, because the concept of a hierarch of acts as explained by Justice Laws was used as the justification for finding the metric martyrs guilty, they were relying on a later British weights and measures act which said that lbs and ounces were legal but were found guilty under an older act.

This is the mess we find ourselves in when government ignore the British constitution and pretend that the documents that go towards forming that constitution are no longer relevant, it only takes one judge to throw a very large spanner into their works.

Neil Herron:

“Leaked Information from the Inland Revenue

Two individuals appear to have already used the Bill of Rights Defence in relation to late payment ‘fines’ by the Inland Revenue…and their lawyers in London are in disarray.
In a leak from an insider, Sunderland based Inland Revenue tax inspector, Phil Craig has been told by Head Office to find out ‘Who this Metric Martyr is and get some ‘background.”
The information disclosed anonymously is that the lawyers have been forwarded two separate instances from individuals using the ‘Bill of Rights Defence’ against Inland Revenue automatic late payment penalties.
As we know, the Bill of Rights 1689 states:
‘That all grants and promises of fines and forfeitures of particular persons before conviction are illegal and void;’

and Lord Justice Laws in the Metric Martyrs Case (Supreme Court of Judicature February 18th 2002) stated:
‘The special status of constitutional statutes follows the special status of constitutional rights. Examples are the Magna Carta, the Bill of Rights 1689….’
‘Ordinary statutes may be impliedly repealed. Constitutional statutes may not.’

It appears therefore, that the Inland Revenue has no lawful authority to impose a ‘fine’ or a ‘charge’ without referring the matter to the courts. No wonder their lawyers are in disarray. They have commented that this could see them in the courts for years.
I will await contact from Mr. Craig, who can then explain exactly why the Inland Revenue are looking for me and exactly what information they are after.”