I have yet to go inside, but the West side of the Square now has the Supreme Court. Outside are two stone seats: [looking from the door of the Supreme Court across the corner of the grassy square in the middle. The Treasury/HMRC building is on the North side. To the right of that is [...]
It is an old and obvious truth that most people do the wrong thing if (A) it is easy to do so, (B) the change of getting caught appears slim, (C) the penalty appears mild. One should perhaps add a fourth condition: (D) that there is no taboo against it. But taboos are hard to [...]
The Appeal Court judgment on this case came out last week. Sharon Shoesmith was the Director of Children’s Services (DCS) in Haringey at the time of the Baby P scandal. The relevant history starts with the Victoria Climbie case, which also happened in Haringey. Victoria Climbie was murdered in February 2000. Her great-aunt Marie-Therese Kouao [...]
We live in strange times. If someone’s child is killed and the police fail to arrest the killer or collect enough evidence for a conviction, then the parents often start a great hue and cry. The police are accused of gross incompetence or institutional racism or worse. The grieving parents are endlessly indulged on prime-time [...]
Over the last couple of days we have had two stories about rape: in both cases about the bringing low of two “big beasts” of politics, Ken Clarke and Dominique Strauss-Kahn (DSK). Ken Clarke (70) lost the Tory leadership election to David Cameron (44), who had never held even the most junior ministerial post. But [...]
