Law in Practice

Nothing succeeds like a success fee: not even an exaggerated claim or one funded by a non-party, says Mark Hill QC 

Sometimes winning is not enough. Costs, which traditionally followed the event, can now have equal importance to the trial itself. A few recent cases indicate the pitfalls which practitioners would do well to avoid and the tactical advantages which can result from prudent manoeuvring on issues of costs. 

Counsel put the following questions to the inaugural Director of the Bingham Centre for the Rule of Law.  

Your career has been unusual in that you have combined being a professor of law at UCL with work as a university administrator (Dean of Law and Vice Provost of UCL), with practice at the Bar (at Blackstone Chambers) and membership of various public bodies. Which of these activities is most relevant to your work for the new Centre? 

Siobhan Grey discusses the Tate Modern and Gray’s Inn symposium on voyeurism, privacy, censorship and surveillance 

The curtain has now fallen on “Exposed” the Tate Modern’s provocative photographic exhibition. It skilfully captured the political and cultural zeitgeist through an exploration of the themes of voyeurism, privacy and surveillance and raised important ethical questions about the taking of illicit or covert photographs. 

Elizabeth Cleaver hopes that the recently adopted European guidelines on child-friendly justice will result in substantial changes in the UK’s treatment of children within the courts 

On 17 November 2010, the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe adopted new Guidelines on Child-Friendly Justice “to serve as a practical tool for member states in adapting their judicial and non-judicial systems to the specific rights, interests and needs of children.” 

The presumption against short prison sentences in Scotland could provide lessons for south of the border, says Dr Sarah Armstrong 

On the very same day in June 2010 that the Lord Chancellor Kenneth Clarke QC MP argued for fewer short prison sentences in England and Wales, the Scottish Parliament passed a law to do just that. The Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Act 2010 creates a presumption against prison sentences of three months or less, culminating a major effort to reform the use of imprisonment here. 

John Cooper QC wonders whether a compartmentalised subject-specific approach to sentencing policy has contributed to the public’s lack of confidence in the regime. Sentencing tariffs should be consistent and comparable with each other, he believes 

John Kampfner sums up the current arguments on libel law reform 

Paul Farrelly, the Labour MP for Newcastle-under-Lyme, is what Tony Blair might have called a feral beast turned hunted prey. A former reporter, he opted for politics in 2001. Since then he has been a doughty human rights campaigner. It was his question to the Justice Secretary in October 2009 about the injunction obtained following publication of the Minton Report on the dumping by Trafigura of toxic waste in the Ivory Coast which brought home to Parliament the activities of claimant legal firms in getting “super-injunctions”. 

Tony Shaw QC and Clive Freedman discuss the draft Guidelines on Information Security and Government Work 

Jonathan Herring claims that it is a divorce lawyer’s world 

Stephen Hockman QC argues the case for a written constitution