23rd May 2022
Some of the best lawyers in the country work for those who often state publicly their disdain for lawyers.
Some of the best media lawyers work for the tabloid press who insult lawyers on front pages and blame them for many social and political ills.
And some of the best regulatory and procedural lawyers help populist politicians and pundits get out of all sorts of scrapes.
None of this is surprising – being part of the tabloid media or being a populist politician or pundit is a high-risk activity.
Such figures will regularly face civil and/or criminal liability in what they want to say or do, but thanks to their good lawyers they are kept safe.
The irony is, of course, that the stock lines-to-take of such figures include ridicule and hostility towards the lawyers who help others.
Those lawyers are ‘activists’ and invariably ‘left-wing’ – some are even ‘human rights’ lawyers.
In other words: the populists dislike lawyers that keep other sorts of people from legal harm, while taking the benefit of lawyers who keep populists safe.
From time-to-time you can see this discrepancy in practical examples.
During the phone-hacking cases, certain publishers took the benefit of outstanding legal advice, while sometimes letting individual reporters and their sources fend for themselves.
And last week we saw the same with the Downing Street parties and the now-closed Metropolitan police investigation.
It would appear that senior Downing Street figures escaped penalties while junior staff incurred them.
And it seems to be the situation that this discrepancy may be because senior figures had the the benefit of deft legal advice in how to complete (and not complete) the questionnaires, while more junior staff provided answers that had not had the benefit of such advice.
This sort of ‘getting off on a technicality’ would – if it were about migrants or other marginalised group, or loud protesters – be met by emphatic criticism from populist politicians and the tabloid press.
But as it is the leaders of a populist government, then there is hardly a word.
There is nothing wrong with such senior figures having access to competent legal advice.
The issue is not that some have access to good lawyers, but that not everyone does.
Everybody facing criminal liability should have access to the legal advice of the standard that assisted Boris Johnson in ‘Partygate’.
And when you next see denouncements of ‘activist’ lawyers, remind yourself that those denouncements often come from those with ready access to the best quality legal advice, when those that need help from ‘activist’ lawyers often do not.
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Another excellent analysis piece. Many thanks for such informative posts.
Kind regards
I am not sure if remains true (if it ever was), but I was once told (of the British Legal System) that one typically gets the justice one can afford.
And it highlights the difference between a legal system and a justice system
My choice of grammar was entirely intentional.
I would expect nothing less.
Advice paid for from the public purse, no doubt.
Well now, that’s a very, very interesting question.
In fact, it’s so interesting I’d like to see an MP ask it at PMQs.
I mention this because, last time I checked, there was no national holiday or bank holiday on the “Prime Minister’s Birthday” and any such event, should it be celebrated, could not be said to have one whiff of work related to it.
This being the case, the timing and the participants of the “Prime Minister’s Birthday bash” would be significant.
If the PM enjoyed legal support from the ‘Office of the Prime Minister’, (or whatever the correct name may be today), then I would say that he has received a ‘benefit in kind’. You see, any legal specialists working in Downing Street would serve there solely for the benefit of advising the PM and/or Ministers for their *Official* duties. Even the PM, shameless as he demonstrably is, could not argue (not – he could and would certainly *try*) that participation in his birthday party were somehow an official Downing Street event.
I’m not sure if it related to the ‘birthday bash’ but in reporting of this I have certainly seen use made of the phrase “bring a bottle”, which further supports the idea that these gatherings were entirely social. We’ve also seen from the photographs that they clearly took place during daytime hours – look at the bright sunlight, length of shadows for the garden images, for example, which show that they were not ‘evening’ events.
So I would argue (and you might have noticed, I can be argumentative when the mood is with me) that any attempt the PM made to secure legal advice from Downing Street employees would lie somewhere between ‘abuse of office’ and ‘fraud’.
Take your pick.
I wonder is any of the civil servants consulted their union, assuming they were members? Perhaps more will be revealed in due course.
Presumably, if SKS swerves Beergate (again) in much the same way DePfeffel swerved his numerous downing street parties, then it will be because Sir Kier “got off on a technicality” because he is, or he employed an “activist Lawyer”?
Because what’s expedient for Conservative PM DePfeffel today will be very different to what’s expedient for the Labour “human rights” lawyer Kier Starmer tomorrow, at least in the eyes of our very non-biased fourth estate.
Sadly, a true story…
About 20 years ago, I was contacted by an old friend – we’d just dropped out of regular contact as life got in the way – and asked if I would be willing to act as a “character witness”. I agreed, discovering in the process that he’d been charged with “theft of electricity” by his supplier and that another friend of his had recommended that he apply for “legal aid”, even though he could have easily afforded professional help. Foolishly, he had agreed.
I took time off work and went to visit, whereupon I was able to use my weak technical and mediocre spreadsheet skills to do some basic sleuthing. We had 15+ years of startlingly consistent usage data to hand, with one aberration (a low reading that had prompted the “investigation” and complaint). But from tabulation we were able to show that if one of the challenged meter readings had a number including the digit “7” instead of the “1” that was recorded, all consumption data would be consistent.
The plaintiff, meanwhile, removed my friend’s physical meter, subjecting it to no less than 3 performance examinations and 2 forensic checks for signs of tampering. Nothing was found. In fact, the only issue of suspicion concerned the lead seal that should have secured the meter and was found on inspection to not have been sealed correctly. Meanwhile, his legal-aid contact asked for some basic documentation (meter readings, statements, precious little else) and did nothing visible prior to trial.
On the morning the trial started, counsel for prosecution approached my friend and his legal-aid counsel and offered a deal… they would not mention two prosecutions he’d acquired as a minor (joy-riding before he even had a license, IIRC) if in return he’d not mention that their star witness had two (adult) prosecutions for theft of electricity – the same charge he was accused of. Startled and under pressure from his legal advisor, he agreed.
He lost the case and was fined.
Shortly thereafter, he lost major contracts from 3 different county level police forces, who explained, sadly, they were not permitted to conduct business with anyone with a conviction. His company went in to decline and he lost all his confidence, becoming a recluse and shell of his former self. Although the experience didn’t wipe him out, he decided to take a “back seat” and hire a manager to take care of the day-to-day. That manager stepped in and managed to crush the rest of the business in short order.
I could not truthfully write here that I *know* he was innocent – I wasn’t there. But I’d known him all my life and known him to be honest to a fault. He passed away a few years ago, still protesting his innocence. He never got past that event.
Moral of the story: buy the best legal advice you can afford.
ALWAYS buy the best legal advice you can afford.
I think we all agree that Bojo should have received multiple fixed penalty notices in respect of “partygate”. He is, to coin a phrase, “as guilty as the man behind the grassy knoll”, yet, again, he gets away with it.
The matter should not be about clever lawyers ghost writing answers to his “questionnaire”, but how such lacunae in the way the laws were drafted were permitted. Equally, if a “questionnaire” can be completed in such a way as to “exonerate” the guily, maybe we could expect that the Met used their nearly £500K to conduct face-to-face interviews (under caution) to assess the guilt, or otherwise of the participants. I do not believe that anybody else in the land who was accused of an infraction of the covid rules was asked to complete a questionnaire. Indeed, if the questionnaire was to be the ultimate test of guilt or innocence, it is a reasonable question to ask why the Met spent so long scrutinising photos or with the interim Gray report – the whole affair could have been wrapped up in a fraction of the time.
In the first few days after the US Federal government released the no-fly restrictions over that country, after the 9/11 attacks in New York, I had to fly to New York for business.
Anyone who has flown out of Terminal 3 will know the layout of the dropping off point: almost directly opposite the main entrance doors to T3, the morning of my flight, there was a smallish Army self-propelled gun – it looked like a tank, except that it had 8 heavy-duty rubber tyres instead of tracks (to save the road surfaces) and this one had a very bored-looking member of the Army visible in the turret.
My taxi driver saw this and laughed, asking me if they were going to “shoot down planes from there…” and I explained that the presence was pure “security theatre” – something that was completely impractical but put there in an attempt to reassure the flying public (and which showed exactly how smart the cabinet thought the travelling public were).
The entire involvement of the Met on the issue of PartyGate was a similarly theatrical farce from start to finish. It was *intended* to run for as long as it did – despite the wealth of valid evidence that would have taken a few days to validate – not because it needed to, but because the government needed it to have the appearance of being substantive.
Assuming that the public would be whipped up by the Opposition to demand that “something must be done”, the government “did something”.
But anyone with a long enough memory will also recall the advice given by Tony Blair to Rebekah Brooks in the wake of the phone hacking scandal – to set up an internal enquiry, to have someone independent come in and run it, but to set the terms of the enquiry so as to ensure that nothing too damaging could be found.
The PM has been PM, Cabinet Minster, MP, and Mayor for long enough to be able to avoid the more obvious land mines of office, so with the Met Commissioner’s job being such a highly political role, it’s also possible that the investigation was a bit more ‘theatre’.
Keep a diary and one day it will keep you.
Early on I was advised to make sure I ‘had some black’ on my boss because if he ever looked like dropping me in it I could tap my nose. So I don’t have that much sympathy for those who have made money grubbing in the ordure that is politics. Maybe they could drop Boris in it but have decided to keep that powder dry – who knows.
Anyway, even Satan deserves a good lawyer.
To quote A Man for All Seasons: “Yes, I’d give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety’s sake.”
I’ve kept a file of emails with the title ‘Insurance’ – and it came in useful several times (on one occasion, it was useful for my employer as I was the only person able to provide a bit of evidence).
Maybe Satan does “deserve” a good lawyer, but so does everybody else (including those who can’t afford one). Satan is often better placed than non-sinners who may not have amassed the same treasures.
I’ve kept a file of emails with the title ‘Insurance’ – and it came in useful several times (on one occasion, it was useful for my employer as I was the only person able to provide a bit of evidence).
Maybe Satan does “deserve” a good lawyer, but so does everybody else (including those who can’t afford one). Satan is often better placed than non-sinners who may not have amassed the same treasures.
Boris Johnson’s dad has just obtained French nationality with which he can now live work and travel throughout the EU.
On his own admission three lawyers fought for him to have this right.
Just think about that.
my landlords reply to my defence reads like it was ranted down the phone at his solicitor, not sure if she’s given him any legal advice at all, they might be playing 4d chess with me of course, lulling me into a false sense of security, it’s stuff like claiming that all they have to do for the pre action protocol is give me a chance to respond before they apply for possession, when the application the courts sent me includes a 5 page form about compliance with loads of stuff in it, every box for “have you done this?” is ticked yes, then the answer says “no we haven’t done this”… and the form itself was produced by the landlords legal dept by the looks, I grant you it could be two departments that never talk to each other…
Can’t help thinking that the greased piglet would have slithered off out of the Met’s clutches, even without benefit of counsel. They seemed at pains to avoid causing him too much bother.
Or should we think of his expensive legal advice as just another brand of grease?
OK, can we say that the publication of photos of the work-meeting-not-a-party represents junior staff using non-judicial methods to get redress?
If you haven’t come across this book you may find it interesting to take a look at Linsey McGoey’s
“The Unknowers; How Strategic Ignorance Rules the World”.
She argues there’s a pattern where a culture and practice of formal ignorance about wrongdoing at the top — and not just a layer of lawyers — protects the powerful. They can, for example, turn up before a Parliamentary Committee and honestly deny knowing about something.
Johnson seems to be one of those people who treat the law as a game. Tactical ignorance and getting away with rule-breaking are legitimate moves in the Game.
For rule-breaking to be an advantage to Game-players like Johnson, it is essential that most people follow the rules. Game-players are not interested in a level playing-field, they want an advantage. There will be no sense of hypocrisy among the players of Games.
As Stanley Johnson demonstrates, they are able to shop around for jurisdictions that best suit them in a way that is not available to most people, and that’s all part of the Game.
“What are you?”. wasn’t that a question posed to Johnson by Keir Starmer?
People suggest different answers speculating about what kind of person we really see. A person who departs so far from the official version of how elected politicians are supposed to behave or pretend to behave. The mask they are expected to wear.
Are Johnson’s actions – or his schtick – explained by something psychologically amiss? A sort of excuse for more unpleasant faults? Is there perhaps a fundamental lack of empathy? That’s a common suggestion.
Or are we watching – as “BrianO” suggests – a player? Presumably someone so immersed in his game that Johnson remains unconcerned for the consequences of his actions for others. Focused only on himself. Another Big Man narcissist ?
Or are his apparent lack of self-insights and concern for others because his privileged background leads to certainty that the game is rigged and always will be fixed in his favour?
Following Linsey McGoey, is Johnson just one more of the charmed group who know that around them are game-riggers? “Their” people whose job is to ensure that “officially” they are never informed; never told.
Johnson can walk through a valley of drunken parties but fears nothing because he will be assured there never were any such parties. And he will feign shock they never told him.
Or is it worse? Are we seeing the highly skilled patter of another showman as dangerous as Donald Trump? Whom Johnson admires.
The author Jodi Dean once described Trump as “the Most Honest Candidate in American Politics”.
Who simply tells enough people the truth they already believe and want confirmed.
“Where other candidates appeal to a fictitious unity or pretense of moral integrity, [Trump] displays the power of inequality. Money buys access — why deny it? Money creates opportunity — for those who have it. Money lets those with a lot of it express their basest impulses and desires. . .”
https://inthesetimes.com/article/donald-trump-republican-president
David,
Interesting to see if this fell in to the scope of either the Met or the Sue Grey investigations:-
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-61566410
Depressing. Not surprising, just depressing.