Best Of

Lower Thames Crossing going ahead - let's hope it actually does.

I agree. Thamesmead has been snakebit by a lack of rail linkage for decades. Apparently the rail extension is going ahead.

Be nice if she made some similar commitments outside of London. A brief statement on TRU - which is already happening - and a vague statement of support without commitment on NPR. Not really enough. But maybe there's no room in the speech for detail.

The Treasury only cares about London because their internal rules on measuring return on investment woefully underestimate the demand for transport. We’ve seen it again and again in recent times - a new transport link finally opens and “surprise!” demand for it turns out to be 5x the original predictions. This persistent error leads them to believe that transport investment only delivers a return in London, and not anywhere else in the country.

You’d think by now they ought to have noticed that their models are shit - presumably there’s some Treasury-specific ideological reason that prevents them from doing so.

FPT ref DavidL's comments on juries

1) "pull jurors out of a hat" - my experience is being sorted into groups of 16 at the beginning of the week but it could just be done by computer in a matter of seconds once the juror register is complete
2) Judge briefing the Jury on their duties and responsibilities - apart from case specific issues this is boilerplate. Could be online with a little quiz and declaration, e.g. "If I do my own research on the internet" will I a) be better briefed than the legal counsel, b) be helping my fellow jurors to understand the case or c) do 6 months d) all of the above?
3) Check in advance whether witnesses need screens and prepare. In your cases I assume it's a given, so the screens should be there by default.

None of the above has to be on the critical path.

My experience is that if you're assigned to a trial in the morning then it's 11.30am by the time you're sat down, HHJ does his solemn briefing etc, now 12, they have a brief conflab and decide that there isn't time for 2 opening addresses before lunch, "jury will only remember one side", so break. 2pm before you're back in court in the afternoon, if Judge or barristers don't have an afternoon clash.

There are delays around sending Juries out and reassembling them, but they can just be sent to the next room rather than allowed to disperse.

Juries can be taken off the critical path for most of it. Leveson has just blamed them for the inefficiency of the professionals involved.