I attended part of the debate today on the Olympics. It was rather complacent – on time, within budget, legacy, culture, regeneration etc. etc. Lord Patten was one of the few to express the concerns that I feel, about, inter alia, transport, security and carbon emission. I have tried and failed to discover the total…
At the General Election, Oxford West and Abingdon’s MP of 13 years, Dr Evan Harris, lost by 176 votes. I hasten to emphasise that this is not a political blog – I am an independent without a vote! But his narrow loss set me thinking about the place of expertise in Parliament. Evan Harris was…
I echo Baroness d’Souza in pointing out that there simply is no more room on the red benches for new peers. I have just come back on Ryanair from a family law conference in Bratislava; the seating was roomy (an empty seat remained in a row of three) compared with the Lords. I raced to get…
Will the appointed peers be evicted shortly to make room for an all-or mainly-elected Upper House/Senate? I will not rehearse the arguments for and against, which are well known, especially to those who read this blog. When I heard that the LibDem-Tory coalition had firm plans to evict us by Christmas, I was very upset. …
The President of the Family Division of the High Court (ie the top family judge in England & Wales) is retiring in 3 days’ time and his successor has not been announced. Another judicial vacancy, in the Supreme Court, has just been filled this week after a search process lasting over four months. Why is…
