Ken Clarke has been appointed Justice Secretary and Lord Chancellor. Ken Clarke was a lawyer, he has kept in touch at his Inn (Gray’s, where he is a bencher) and gets a resounding endorsement from former Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer. Clarke could be good news for, law, the rule of law and for lawyers.
Clarke is known for his independence – affirmed by Charlie Falconer on the BBC this morning. Clarke has, of course, had experience of the law and order brief when he was Home Secretary. Will he be liberal?
This interesting BBC report from 2006 is worth reading again…
Former Conservative Chancellor Ken Clarke has said David Cameron’s plans for a British Bill of Rights are “xenophobic and legal nonsense”….Mr Clarke said the Tory leader would find it difficult to find lawyers who would agree with his plan to replace the Human Rights Act with the new Bill.
With law bloggers Carl Gardner (Head of Legal blog) and Jack of Kent I plan to keep a very close watch on the Justice Ministry and, of course, The Home Office now headed by Theresa May.
Also of considerable interest, given the new coalition is The Freedom Bill. The coalition could well prove to be a moderating influence and a new era for lawyers given plans to repeal a number of repressive new Labour laws. There is also a commitment to scrap ID cards.
It is just a pity, for those of a Labour disposition, that it will take a Tory-Lib coalition to undo what Labour has done or planned to do. Hopefully Labour, in opposition, will note that civil liberties are far more important to most people than the minutiae of dogma and policy. Hopefully, the cuts to the legal aid budget will not be too vicious – it costs money to have a rule of law and justice system worthy of Britain.
I return now to my daily detailed Law Reviews…. not before time, some might say? I shall, of course, continue to watch the vagaries and absurdities of political and life generally… but there will be a lot more law from now on – as evidenced by my podcast with Jack of Kent below.
CIVIL LIBERTIES REFORM FROM COALITION AGREEMENT
10. Civil liberties
The parties agree to implement a full programme of measures to reverse the substantial erosion of civil liberties under the Labour Government and roll back state intrusion.
The parties agree to implement a full programme of measures to reverse the substantial erosion of civil liberties under the Labour Government and roll back state intrusion.
This will include:
- A Freedom or Great Repeal Bill.
- The scrapping of ID card scheme, the National Identity register, the next generation of biometric passports and the Contact Point Database.
- Outlawing the finger-printing of children at school without parental permission.
- The extension of the scope of the Freedom of Information Act to provide greater transparency.
- Adopting the protections of the Scottish model for the DNA database.
- The protection of historic freedoms through the defence of trial by jury.
- The restoration of rights to non-violent protest.
- The review of libel laws to protect freedom of speech.
- Safeguards against the misuse of anti-terrorism legislation.
- Further regulation of CCTV.
- Ending of storage of internet and email records without good reason.
- A new mechanism to prevent the proliferation of unnecessary new criminal offences.
Seems to be based substantially on the Freedom Bill. It will be interesting to see how this shapes up and how quickly it will come through.
Download the Coalition Agreement
ID CARDS TO BE SCRAPPED
Both Parties that now form the new Government stated in their manifestos that they will cancel Identity Cards and the National Identity Register. We will announce in due course how this will be achieved. Applications can continue to be made for ID cards but we would advise anyone thinking of applying to wait for further announcements.
Until Parliament agrees otherwise, identity cards remain valid and as such can still be used as an identity document and for travel within Europe. We will update you with further information as soon as we have it.
Yes, I think Ken Clarke will be generally welcomed but I am not sure sure the same can be said of Theresa May at the Home Office.
Chris Huhne, whose name was against the Freedom Bill, has gone to Energy and Climate Change.
I await the COALITION’s “Law and Order” programme with interest.
Will the Bill of Rights and Responsibilties come to fruition and will it repeal the Human Rights Act 1998?
Just which “repressive laws” will be repealed now that these parties are in power? I suspect that there will be a bit of selective pruning rather than wholesale removal. You have to remember that there was often much inter-party agreement at the time some of these “repressive laws” were passed.
As an example, in the “wash up”, Cameron allowed through the Crime and Security Act 2010 with new rules about retention of DNA profiles. Not really an adequate answer (in my view) to the Marper case. However, will Cameron now return to a further look at this and amendment? I have some doubts.
Will legal services be funded properly particularly the Magistrates’ Courts where legal representation is becoming a rarity. I was speaking to a group of very experienced Magistrates’ Court solicitors only yesterday and a more dispirited bunch it would be hard to find.
We will all be watching closely and hopefully commenting.
charon, if you think a conservative administration will be less repressive and more careful of the rule of law, i consider you are being (with respect) optimistic without any foundation in fact. i speak in general and of ken clarke in particular.
let’s look at ken’s record.
cuddly avuncular ken was a cabinet minister under margaret thatcher and was fully complicit in the illegal and anti-democratic use of the police against a variety of trade unionists. he was never reported as speaking out against that. you will remember that during the miners’ strike, the police took to arresting any four males in a car on the A1 on the assumption that they were flying pickets and intended to commit a crime. great civil liberties! has he resiled from that?
this was also the government that used section 28 (or 27 if you wish) to attempt to ban the ‘promotion’ of homosexuality. has he now decided that was wrong? nice repression!
he was a cabinet minister in john major’s government enmired by sleaze and scandal of a sexual and financial nature – and much more crucially in my opinion while all the while they espoused the spurious ideal of ‘family values’. has he now distanced himself from that? au contraire – if the daily telegraph is to be believed, he ‘flipped’ his council tax and denied that either of his two residences were his main home to suit his own pocket. i do hope his new job won’t involve his making any decisions relying on the ghosh test, as his concept of honesty is an interesting one. let us compare the opprobrium heaped on jacqui smith over a porn film. what cost the country more?
he is on the board of a hedge fund company. is he to be even-handed in any question of legal regulation of the financial institutions?
i do not claim he has a worse track record than previous incumbents, but i see no evidence that he will be better.
The Coalition agreement is quite encouraging and seems to be going to look at the DNA database protections. As ever, the detail is awaited but so far so good.
Obiter J – agree… the detail is all. Thanks for your other observations on posts. We could see some real advances made if Clarke et al can actually pull this off in CivLib terms…
We shall, I am sure, be watching.
is my comment in the spambot? granted it wasn’t a great comment but i did my best…
charon?
‘the review of libel laws to protect freedom of speech’
fab!!!! i take it they will also be making it a LAW that the sun must do an acceptable amount of shining and make people happy?
[…] legislation from the last decade (which I was bemoaning in a previous post). I agree with Charon QC that it’s a pity – no, make that shameful – that it takes a Conservative/Lib Dem […]
SW – Ken Clarke does steer a rather curious path at times – and I do recall his less than illiberal times. He is, however, regarded as more likely to be liberal and engage in sensible debate with the profession than some.
We shall have to wait and see how the much vaunted civil liberties reform pans out. I will be far from alone in watching – and commenting!
does ken clarke now join the house of lords?will there be as bielection?will both tories and liberals put up candisates?
No. Ken Clarke does not need to be a peer to be Lord Chancellor. Jack Straw was Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor and is still an MP.
It used to be the case, however, that Lord Chancellor’s were made peers. Things have changed – for the better, in my view!
I find Ken Clarke as Lord chancellor has taken bold step to reduce Legal Aid bill. It will go down in history if he put limits on solicitors charges as these are out of line with UK bottom end and middle class earners.