eurealist.co.uk

The Law is the Law, In response to Council Watcher (Letters, Feb 3), on February 18, 2002, Lord Justice Laws made an unequivocal statement in his High Court verdict denying the Metric Martyrs appeal against conviction that (in the “new legal era” in which we now live) Constitutional Acts, including the Bill of Rights, cannot be repealed by implication alone, but can be repealed only by explicit wording to that effect.

It is therefore inescapable that, unless and until Lord Justice Law’s view is reversed, that is the law.

The 1991 Road Traffic Act which brought in Decriminalised Parking Enforcement did not explicitly repeal Article 11 of the Bill of Rights: “That all grants and promises of fines and forfeitures of particular persons before conviction are illegal and void”.

Therefore, the 1991 Road Traffic Act is null and void as the law now stands.

In plain and simple terms - either the Metric Martyrs were guilty and the decriminalised parking fine system is illegal, or the Metric Martyrs were innocent and the parking fine system is legal.

One or the other - but not both!

Neil Herron and the Metric Martyrs Campaign’s intention is to overturn the wrongful convictions of the Metric Martyrs, including the late Steven Thoburn.

If the convictions are not overturned then nationally, £1billion-worth of parking fines annually are under threat.

If the convictions are overturned and the Martyrs are declared innocent then the case which established the primacy of EU law falls.

Colin Moran

Metric Martyrs Defence Fund

Frederick Street

Sunderland

This is the issue the political elites in the government will not, face preferring instead to rely on parliamentary convention that parliament cannot bind itself. Even though Lord Justice Laws accepted that convention, he made it clear that even if parliament could change any law, they cannot do so clandestinely. Of course the Regulatory Reform Bill will allow them to do just that.

Technorati Tags: bill-of-rights-1689, british-democracy, constitution

From Liberty Central

Written by Unity

A looking at some of the acts of parliament the Government have refused exemptions from the provisions, makes frightening reading, and begs the question what exactly are Tony Blair’s intentions.

Looking at just some of these Acts, one has to wonder quite justification the government can have not making them of part one of this bill, which affords Ministers unprecedented powers to make, amend and repeal legislation with the minimum of Parliamentary scrutiny.

Amongst the various matters that the government are currently unwilling to exempt from this bill are:

Every single protection against the arbitrary and unlawful detention of citizens by the state (Habeas Corpus Acts, Bail Act, Human Rights Act);

The independence of the Scottish judiciary and legal system (Act of Union);

The Monarchy (Act of Settlement, Succession to the Crown Act, Claim of Right);

Parliamentary democracy (Representation of the People Acts, House of Lords Act. Parliamentary Constituencies Act, Ministers of the Crown Act, Parliament Acts);

Devolved government in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland (Scotland Act, Government of Wales Acts, Government of Ireland Act);

The independence of Canada, Australia and New Zealand – no seriously, this is in the Statute of Westminster – plus about a dozen other ‘Commonwealth Realms’, including Jamaica, the Bahamas and Papua New Guinea.

And that’s just a few of highlights – without even getting in Magna Carta and the Bill of Rights.

In case you’ve missed the start of this whole debate, this is how the purpose of the bill was described by Cabinet Officer Minister, Jim Murphy, at the start of its committee stage:

“The Bill builds on the Regulatory Reform Act 2001. It aims to deliver on the Government’s agenda of better regulation. As part of that, however, we need to ensure through our deliberations in these eight sittings that there is a correct level of effective parliamentary scrutiny. Ultimately, however, the Bill is intended to maintain the UK’s competitiveness, free up public sector workers and others from bureaucracy, and remove unnecessary regulation.”

So why does a bill that is supposedly designed to “maintain the UK’s competitiveness, free up public sector workers and others from bureaucracy, and remove unnecessary regulation” need to include the power to amend core constitutional legislation?

Does the government think that Scotland’s constitutional right to its own independent judiciary is ‘uncompetitive’?

Is Habeas Corpus an ‘unnecessary regulation’?

a correct level of effective parliamentary scrutiny. Would that be code for less?

Technorati Tags: Tony Blair, repeal legislation, arbitrary and unlawful detention of citizens,

I did not know that there was such a thing as “consumer rights’ day”

The Brussels Journal

Chresten Anderson

Today the Austrian EU Presidency is organising the 8th European Consumer Day, in cooperation with the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC). The date marks US President John F. Kennedy’s declaration to the US Congress on 15 March 1962, when he spoke in support of consumers and spelled out four fundamental consumer rights (the right to safety; the right to be informed; the right to choose; the right to be heard).

In 1985 the United Nations decided that each year 15 March would be a special consumer rights’ day across the world. In 1999 the European Consumer Day (ECD) was launched at the EESC’s initiative, with the aim of making the public more aware of EU consumer policy and informing people of the ongoing work in this area.

In his 1962 speech Kennedy defined the four fundamental rights of consumers.

1. The right to safety: the right to be protected against products, production processes and services that are hazardous to health or life.

2. The right to be informed: the right to be given the facts and information you need to make your own choices.

3. The right to choose: the right to be able to choose from a range of products and services offered at competitive prices. As a consumer, you have the right to expect satisfactory quality.

4. The right to be heard: the right to have your interests as a consumer represented in government policy.

All of those rights are sensible, and luckily a free and functioning market process can ensure them all.

Unfortunately, however, governments have interfered, restricting consumers’ rights:

In order to guarantee European consumers their fundamental rights it is necessary that they once again become free to make their own choices – and not have Brussels bureaucrats make the choices for them.

Full article here

Technorati Tags: EU, Food, European Consumer Day,

The Adams Smith Institute

By Dr Eamonn Butler

There are of course many old laws still in place in the United Kingdom. Some years ago, Lord Harris of High Cross formed what he called the ‘Repeal Group’ in the attempt to get them wiped off the statute book. But most people, especially busy parliamentary business managers, could not see the point of repealing laws that nobody took a blind bit of notice of anyway.

Harris was right. If laws are on the statute book, it is a hostage to fortune that some bloody-minded politician will resurrect and use them, even though they are no longer relevant to today’s circumstances…………. But you only need to look at how modern laws are stretched by the police and others – holding a heckler at the Labour Party conference and a cyclist in Dundee under anti-terrorist laws, or arresting a women harmlessly reading out the names of war dead by the Cenotaph in London’s Whitehall.

My concern that bad laws can come back to bite us unless ruthlessly culled is made all the more poignant by the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill now going through the House of Commons. It empowers ministers to amend or repeal any law, supposedly in order to adjust minor administrative inconveniences. The trouble is that a tyrannical government could use the measure to do what it liked, without the minor administrative inconvenience of Parliament. Indeed, when you look at this idea, you might well conclude that such tyranny has already arrived.

Technorati Tags: Law, Regulatory Reform Bill, tyrannical government, Parliament

There are now numerous ways in which information and entertainment of the type the BBC provides can be obtained: terrestrial broadcast, satellite transmission, internet and mobile phone transmission. There are also many providers of services through these channels. In the coming years more will emerge.

To expect the BBC to be able to exist in its present form for another 10 years is unrealistic. Soon the huge range of material available from other sources will make the licence fee uncollectable. People will refuse to pay a poll tax like this and the methods of scrutiny necessary to enforce it will become intolerable.

In future the BBC should be funded by voluntary donations. The resulting organisation would be very different from the one it is today. But if it really is as popular as it claims to be, such finance should make it viable and able to provide a worthwhile and valued service.

Christopher Rose, Grangetown, Sunderland