The Lords gave judgment yesterday in this complex case, about confiscation of the proceeds of drugs offences. The main issue is actually whether the judge ruling on confiscation can take into account criminal conduct that the defendant has never […]

Both Pub Philosopher and Paul Waugh have noticed something about the Equality Bill: the government’s explanatory note to clause 10 (scroll up the page for the note), which defines “belief” for the purposes of preventing discrimination on […]

The Equality Bill published yesterday does quite a lot of things: it aims to replace existing discrimination law on sex, race, age and so on, and update it, harmonising the protection given to each “protected characteristic”, which in many […]

It’s a month since the government published its green paper on rights and responsibilities, and I’ve written nothing about it yet; I’ve been trying to gather the strength. I also managed to miss the justice minister responsible, Michael Wills, […]

A couple of days ago I was interviewed by Natasha Phillips of Divorce Manual – we spoke for an hour about, gosh, lots of things: my legal career, how I got interested in human rights, […]

Charon QC interviewed me today about the Damian Green affair: we spoke about how the leak investigation began, the DPP’s decision not to prosecute, Jacqui Smith’s responsibility and vulnerability and the questions she needs to answer if she’s to […]

I’ve consistently argued that ministers, not the police, should be the focus of scrutiny in the Greengate/Galleygate affair. The initial controversy was about the arrest of Damian Green, and search of his office: that’s of course the first any of […]

I was interviewed on the Damian Green affair for today’s 5 Live morning reports, which went out at the crack of dawn: you can listen here for the next week. The Damian Green item starts at […]

The more you reflect on Greengate/Galleygate, the more serious it seems. The charge laid by Damian Green is that ministers have acted in an authoritarian manner; understandably from his point of view he sees that as illustrating this government’s instincts.

So now we know that no charges will be brought against either Damian Green or Christopher Galley. Here is the CPS statement explaining its decision.

The real point about this scandal is not the conduct of the police […]