Although the Commons rose last week for the summer recess, the House of Lords is sitting until Wednesday. The work the House is doing this week is well adumbrated by the BBC’s Mark D’Arcy in his blog.
Today, the House is in committee on the Justice and Security Bill. The deliberations are notable for the peers who are present. They include a batch of leading QCs, including Lord Pannick, Lord Lester of Herne Hill, Lord Marks of Henley and Lord Thomas of Gresford. They include members who have served as head of MI5 (Baroness Manningham-Buller), Lord Chancellor (Lord Falconer of Thoroton QC, Lord Mackay of Clashfern QC), Attorney General (Lord Goldsmith QC), law lord (Lord Lloyd of Berwick QC, who also headed an inquiry into terrorist legislation), Lord Chief Justice (Lord Woolf QC), Cabinet Secretary (Lord Butler of Brockwell) and as Defence ministers (Lord Reid and Lord Gilbert, though in speaking earlier Lord Reid drew on his experience as Home Secretary in dealing with national security). There are other peers also participating, drawing on different experiences and expertise, but listening to the deliberations on amendments one could not fail to be struck by the high level of debate and the recognition of the need to achieve a balance between justice and security. As the minister, Lord Wallace of Tankerness QC, observed, the Bill is not a justice or security Bill but a justice and security Bill.
“one could not fail to be struck by the high level of debate
and the recognition of the need to achieve a balance
between justice and security”
First, Parliaments should be enabling every level of The People, in both the Workplace and the Lifeplace;
whilst both the quantity and quality of both “justice” and “security” depend
win-lose competitively
upon how much private-wealth and public-power any individual human-being possesses
“a balance”
will continue to be
both morally and sustainworthinessly impossible to achieve.
Second, without having first conducted and exhausted Public-Information-Sharing and Public-Discussion of the Issue-at-Hand,
no debate
(especially among the current-and-further-planned establishmentarianly-oligarchic House of Lords Members)
could ever be honestly assessed as being of a “high level”.
need to achieve a balance between justice and security. …….. the Bill is not a justice or security Bill but a justice and security Bill.
Has the Lord Norton got a link to that bill?
‘Justice’ is often an over-endowed word, by the “We want justice” species of demonstrator, and ‘security’ may well be too, but without seeing the bill it is difficult to know.
Security may refer to state security which again refers to an externalization of the need to create and maintain the nation state, in a world of rapidly changing loyalties.
BBC, and state propaganda, has a lot to do with the success of any security intitiative, as with 07/07…. 21/07/
Twm O’r Nant: The Bill is available at:
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/bills/lbill/2012-2013/0027/13027.pdf
Dear Lord Norton,
I am deemed to point out that the failure of jurisprudences and outdated statutes should give vent to a codified law system and the best experiment would be a “security code act”.
This code should register under codified numbers all the acts and judgments given in the matter of security . For instance , “The football disorder act” or any other subject related to the matter of security should be found there in.
Codified numbers for instance starting from three digits numbers example articles 100:football disorder act(should include the law as it is and the judgement given in that case)
101: careless driving act(should include the law as it is and the judgement given in those cases)
102: terrorism act and so on
This code should be codified in such a way that it could be refered by magistrates without the use for them to look up in jurisprudences or statutes .The Magistrates would therefore have the freedom to give a different ruling from that mentionned in outdated statutes and jurisprudences .
This first experimental code should be updated each year by the legislator.
God bless the United Kingdom. God save the Queen and the Lords.
Nazma FOURRE
Thanks to the noble lord for the link to the Bills in Parliament.
Having stood alongside various lords chancellor in the corridors from time to time, I must say that some of their insights gained from being in the thick of things like that,
surely makes them uniquely qualified to make the judgements they do make with regard to Justice and Security issues.
Dear Lord Norton,
I am glad that Garett Howell note the importance of the Lords in Parliament.At least he gives them the credit and the merits that they should get.
God save the Queen and the Lords. God bless the United Kingdom.
Nazma FOURRE