I wonder in what % of trials the judge privately disagrees with the verdict of the jury?
20% maybe?
Doesn't mean the judge is right though. Having been on a jury and been impressed at how seriously it took its duty I am a big fan of jury trials, they are a cornerstone of our justice system.
Certainly not arguing for a different system. Can't really think of a better one. I was just wondering how often the judge thinks "Oh, wow. Wasn't expecting that." Is it hardly at all - like 5% or so - or is it quite often, e.g. 15% 20% type thing?
I have never been called. A pity since I would like to do it - although not on a gory one.
I had the weirdest jury experience - I was visiting another city for the day and was approached by a policeman outside the county court and pressganged on the spot to join a jury to make up the numbers. I didn't even know that was possible.
I would not have thought so either. Although this can happen with witnesses for a wedding and it's not so far from that.
Re jury duty, my ideal would be to pull off a Henry Fonda, the lone "not guilty" hold-out against 11 people jumping to the conclusion that the dodgy looking geezer in the dock had dun it, who slowly but surely turns them all around with quiet, remorseless logic.
I am not suitable to serve, in other words.
I thought of doing a reverse Fonda. I was the ony guilty verdict and wondered if I could turn the other 11 around but it was a trivial case and I decided not to bother.
Really? You were 1 against 11? Gosh. That is uncomfortable.
I was two against ten. A late night punch up in a kebab shop. The evidence clearly pointed to guilty as charged but the rest of the jury clearly thought the case had been brought for bad reasons, that there was some blame on all sides (both probably true) and gave little weight to the police evidence.
At the time I was annoyed at having spent a whole week and arriving at the wrong answer. Looking back I am more sanguine and quite possibly the jury had a point in disregarding the strict technical question we were supposed to be answering and reaching a conclusion on wider grounds.
So if Robert Jenrick hadn't (unlawfully? illegally?) fast-tracked this decision, the taxpayer would be 45m+ quid better off?
Or to put it another way, Jenrick has more than undone all the work of Captain Tom in raising money?
Not quite it's £40m but yes...
Not just that.
If Jenrick had not approved the 1500 dwellings would not have been built for another 5-10 years, as is now going to happen. As the scheme would not have been viable, and TH had rejected it anyway.
Pros and cons.
Back to the drawing board for Desmond.
So Jenrick would have enabled 1500 families to get a home?
TH should be ashamed of themselves but instead of TH being attacked for NIMBYism people are attacking the only person to do the right thing.
Assuming that is what they would be used for.
In planning and property it always takes years to do anything. Gaining possession of a normal residential let can routinely take 5-6 months for the whole process if it needs the Court.
Moving a small business needs a planned time of 12-18 months. I did that a couple of years ago and industrial estate owners were seriously saying "sign a 10 year rental agreement and then we will build you a unit".
Creating a scheme and getting PP and building it can be anything from 2-15 years.
I rushed through a PP on a smallish - 100 unit 0 housing estate in 2013 to beat the deadline of a new local plan, then the land was sold to a developer with Outline PP in 2014. Otherwise it would have been wait until 2028 for the next cycle.
This is now 2020 and the entrance road has been built after 5 years of wrangles, and the Council still don't have an approved Local Plan. The latest lot started from scratch again last summer.
Separate from the Jenrick imbroglio, that's why "a million extra houses built in 5 years" claims are hilarious, and why I think the last 2-3 governments have done a decent job in increasing housebuilding just on the numbers, whatever we think of the planning reforms that they have used to do it.
I can well believe there are downsides to trial by jury. But I think they would be eclipsed by the downsides of the alternatives.
What is wrong with Show Trials? They are very popular in some parts of the world and help speed up the legal process too. No months and months spent educating a Jury....
Of course, over in Northern Ireland they abolished juries for some decades, but I have not seen any mention of it on here and @Cyclefree did not bring it up.
Diplock Courts anyone???
Always thought that was a strangely appropriate name - a cross between a dipstick and a pillock.
Oh, look, it's another luvvie who's literally a communist. Do they grow them in a vat somewhere?
As a matter of interest do you have a preferred profession (other than acting) for people who take a dim view of capitalism?
Chartered surveyor perhaps? Something in retail?
Unemployed people who don't vote, preferably.
I often muse about if we had a full-on socialist economy whether a person in a good job - e.g. managing the local food cooperative - would be attacked as a hypocrite for opining that introduction of the profit motive would improve the distribution chain.
I can well believe there are downsides to trial by jury. But I think they would be eclipsed by the downsides of the alternatives.
What is wrong with Show Trials? They are very popular in some parts of the world and help speed up the legal process too. No months and months spent educating a Jury....
Of course, over in Northern Ireland they abolished juries for some decades, but I have not seen any mention of it on here and @Cyclefree did not bring it up.
Diplock Courts anyone???
Always thought that was a strangely appropriate name - a cross between a dipstick and a pillock.
Doncaster is an interesting choice of example - I've lost count of the number of dodgy dealings there....
I've never met anyone who didn't think this sort of thing was happening everywhere with all politicians.
Ever met anyone who thought it should be?
Only if its them wanting the planning permission
Resigned acceptance is the usual response with cynical sarcasm if the situation involves dubious foreigners.
When the likes of Blair and Osborne get endless millions after leaving office for vague services to foreign investment banks its hard to get morally righteous about dodgy dealings lower down the food chain.
I don't find it hard.
Now I may be being cynical here but people seem to find it easier to be morally righteous when its one of 'their side' rather than one of 'our side'
Well I don't. What can I say.
If the default response to bad behaviour is just to search the archives for other bad behaviour - either for partisan defence reasons or to demonstrate one's 'man of the world' seasoned cynicism - the result is that bad behaviour becomes the accepted norm.
Righteous anger fuels benign change. Lazy cynicism fuels moral turpitude.
My righteous anger reserves need recharging, they've had a lot of use over the years.
Well Daltrey is a raging Tory of course, but Townshend wrote the song and he did NOT intend it as an apologia for dodgy housing deals and corruption in high places.
"Only in Brixton, you’ll see feds getting run out of the area" gloat the BLM supporters, as gangs with swords and hammers injure 15 policemen, put 2 in hospital and smash up their cars
So if Robert Jenrick hadn't (unlawfully? illegally?) fast-tracked this decision, the taxpayer would be 45m+ quid better off?
Or to put it another way, Jenrick has more than undone all the work of Captain Tom in raising money?
Not quite it's £40m but yes...
Not just that.
If Jenrick had not approved the 1500 dwellings would not have been built for another 5-10 years, as is now going to happen. As the scheme would not have been viable, and TH had rejected it anyway.
Pros and cons.
Back to the drawing board for Desmond.
So Jenrick would have enabled 1500 families to get a home?
TH should be ashamed of themselves but instead of TH being attacked for NIMBYism people are attacking the only person to do the right thing.
Assuming that is what they would be used for.
In planning and property it always takes years to do anything. Gaining possession of a normal residential let can routinely take 5-6 months for the whole process if it needs the Court.
Moving a small business needs a planned time of 12-18 months. I did that a couple of years ago and industrial estate owners were seriously saying "sign a 10 year rental agreement and then we will build you a unit".
Creating a scheme and getting PP and building it can be anything from 2-15 years.
I rushed through a PP on a smallish - 100 unit 0 housing estate in 2013 to beat the deadline of a new local plan, then the land was sold to a developer with Outline PP in 2014. Otherwise it would have been wait until 2028 for the next cycle.
This is now 2020 and the entrance road has been built after 5 years of wrangles, and the Council still don't have an approved Local Plan. The latest lot started from scratch again last summer.
Separate from the Jenrick imbroglio, that's why "a million extra houses built in 5 years" claims are hilarious, and why I think the last 2-3 governments have done a decent job in increasing housebuilding just on the numbers, whatever we think of the planning reforms that they have used to do it.
and there are tons of unimplemented permissions, developers sitting on a lot of undeveloped land, and not much more than half of all permissions for new homes actually get built. Developers are to blame for the housing shortage, not the planning system. It is almost as if there is some reason why they might like there to be a shortage of supply.
Oh, look, it's another luvvie who's literally a communist. Do they grow them in a vat somewhere?
As a matter of interest do you have a preferred profession (other than acting) for people who take a dim view of capitalism?
Chartered surveyor perhaps? Something in retail?
Toilet cleaning?
"You'd be better off if you stopped whining and concentrated on being the best lavatory operative you can be."
Would be my prediction there.
Sound advice. Very sound.
Of course, Jupiter Jones went from Loo Cleaner to Queen of half the Universe. She just had to kill off her brothers first and deal with the Intergalactic Bureaucracy first
I wonder in what % of trials the judge privately disagrees with the verdict of the jury?
20% maybe?
Doesn't mean the judge is right though. Having been on a jury and been impressed at how seriously it took its duty I am a big fan of jury trials, they are a cornerstone of our justice system.
Certainly not arguing for a different system. Can't really think of a better one. I was just wondering how often the judge thinks "Oh, wow. Wasn't expecting that." Is it hardly at all - like 5% or so - or is it quite often, e.g. 15% 20% type thing?
I have never been called. A pity since I would like to do it - although not on a gory one.
I had the weirdest jury experience - I was visiting another city for the day and was approached by a policeman outside the county court and pressganged on the spot to join a jury to make up the numbers. I didn't even know that was possible.
I would not have thought so either. Although this can happen with witnesses for a wedding and it's not so far from that.
Re jury duty, my ideal would be to pull off a Henry Fonda, the lone "not guilty" hold-out against 11 people jumping to the conclusion that the dodgy looking geezer in the dock had dun it, who slowly but surely turns them all around with quiet, remorseless logic.
I am not suitable to serve, in other words.
I thought of doing a reverse Fonda. I was the ony guilty verdict and wondered if I could turn the other 11 around but it was a trivial case and I decided not to bother.
Really? You were 1 against 11? Gosh. That is uncomfortable.
I was two against ten. A late night punch up in a kebab shop. The evidence clearly pointed to guilty as charged but the rest of the jury clearly thought the case had been brought for bad reasons, that there was some blame on all sides (both probably true) and gave little weight to the police evidence.
At the time I was annoyed at having spent a whole week and arriving at the wrong answer. Looking back I am more sanguine and quite possibly the jury had a point in disregarding the strict technical question we were supposed to be answering and reaching a conclusion on wider grounds.
That's certainly one of the traditional defences of juries. They have the power and the right to look past the technicalities and take a broader view. I think I am right in saying that a lot of advances in our statutes are due to the reluctance of juries to convict where the punishment plainly didn't fit the crime. (Theft of bread and hands chopped off come to mind.)
Personally however I would convict anyone found in the vicinity of a kebab shop.
Oh, look, it's another luvvie who's literally a communist. Do they grow them in a vat somewhere?
As a matter of interest do you have a preferred profession (other than acting) for people who take a dim view of capitalism?
Chartered surveyor perhaps? Something in retail?
Toilet cleaning?
"You'd be better off if you stopped whining and concentrated on being the best lavatory operative you can be."
Would be my prediction there.
"And at the end of each day's work go home and stay home and don't express your views on any social topics in public. There's a good lavatory operator."
Oh, look, it's another luvvie who's literally a communist. Do they grow them in a vat somewhere?
As a matter of interest do you have a preferred profession (other than acting) for people who take a dim view of capitalism?
Chartered surveyor perhaps? Something in retail?
Toilet cleaning?
There was a grim short period in Germany in the ?70s? when communists were banned from all public service jobs, such as being engine drivers or post office staff. It was rapidly seen as overreach and rescinded. (For clarity, I also don't see why someone with far-right views shouldn't be an engine-driver or a postman, so long as their private views don't affect how they work.)
We all seem to be quite down on people who clean toilets don't we? Toilet cleaning - tee hee. I am not sure why. Not only is it a vital job, it's a job which you can indeed do badly, indifferently, well, or superbly. You can also if you feel so inclined, take on another cleaner, and another, and build a multi-million pound facilities management empire - it's been done.
It's interesting how the "Israeli's do it" excuse winds its way through public discourse.
After De Mendes was shot - the police claimed "Israeli's do it like that". The Israelis pointed out that if they shot every suspected suicide bomber, they wouldn't have such a large collection of attempted suicide bombers in prison.
And it seems to be the product of a vivid imagination by the Met and Amnesty :-)
I wasn't aware that Maxine Peake was "venerated".
She is a respected thespian but I would not say venerated. She's no "Judy" or "Helen" or "Maggie".
As an aside, this well supports what I was getting at the other day with my "tee shirt" test. Peake is as far left as Tommy Robinson is far right. But there is not an equivalence. If a thousand Tommys are marching with the Football Lads and a thousand Maxines are marching against them, it would be wrong to say they were "as bad as each other." I think we all know this really.
At various times a certain multi identity PB personality has attempted to justify Tommy Robinson. I'm pretty sure he/they would have a good shot at why a thousand TRs are actually better than a thousand MPs.
Return of aforesaid is presumably just a matter of time. People rarely seem to manage to escape. Or rather they do, they tunnel out, but then it turns out they've forgotten something and have to tunnel back in again.
I have served once on a jury and foreman (foreperson?) at that. The case involved an alleged attack on a police officer. The barrister for the defence was very good; that for the prosecution pretty rubbish. After considerable discussion I called a preliminary vote. It was 6-6. Further discussion - still the same result. Reported to the judge who thanked us then dismissed us. I later found out it was a re-trial as the original jury could not make up its mind. Really felt like a waste of time.
I was two against ten. A late night punch up in a kebab shop.
Mine was probably heading a similar way, but the two of us were unconvinced. Won't bore you with the details, but the guy looked kinda shifty, and was almost certainly guilty of something ..... but exactly what the govt lawyer hadn't pinned down to a good level.
Ended up as a not proven - good example of the use of that verdict I think. I'd have probably gone not guilty otherwise, but likely nobody else would have.
We all seem to be quite down on people who clean toilets don't we? Toilet cleaning - tee hee. I am not sure why. Not only is it a vital job, it's a job which you can indeed do badly, indifferently, well, or superbly. You can also if you feel so inclined, take on another cleaner, and another, and build a multi-million pound facilities management empire - it's been done.
We all seem to be quite down on people who clean toilets don't we? Toilet cleaning - tee hee. I am not sure why. Not only is it a vital job, it's a job which you can indeed do badly, indifferently, well, or superbly. You can also if you feel so inclined, take on another cleaner, and another, and build a multi-million pound facilities management empire - it's been done.
Quite so, and talking of underappreciated jobs I just received this rather touching email from a friend. I share it here to illustrate that it is not just NHS workers that we should be thanking:
" ....I bumped into the cashier at M&S I always liked - she's my age or younger, and yet her face was quite red, so I asked her how she was. She'd been in intensive care for a month, in a coma - on a ventilator. They weaned her off with oxygen and now she's home for a month, resting. She says her lungs are permanently damaged, and sometimes she can barely walk. Poor thing! She's glad to be alive ... how awful ... the price she has paid just to work at M&S. "
We all seem to be quite down on people who clean toilets don't we? Toilet cleaning - tee hee. I am not sure why. Not only is it a vital job, it's a job which you can indeed do badly, indifferently, well, or superbly. You can also if you feel so inclined, take on another cleaner, and another, and build a multi-million pound facilities management empire - it's been done.
You are unlikely to get paid to clean toilets superbly, unless you work for a high end hotel perhaps. I have cleaned toilets professionally and if I'd taken the time to clean them superbly I would have been told off for wasting my time when I had other things to be getting on with.
I wonder in what % of trials the judge privately disagrees with the verdict of the jury?
20% maybe?
Doesn't mean the judge is right though. Having been on a jury and been impressed at how seriously it took its duty I am a big fan of jury trials, they are a cornerstone of our justice system.
Certainly not arguing for a different system. Can't really think of a better one. I was just wondering how often the judge thinks "Oh, wow. Wasn't expecting that." Is it hardly at all - like 5% or so - or is it quite often, e.g. 15% 20% type thing?
I have never been called. A pity since I would like to do it - although not on a gory one.
I had the weirdest jury experience - I was visiting another city for the day and was approached by a policeman outside the county court and pressganged on the spot to join a jury to make up the numbers. I didn't even know that was possible.
I would not have thought so either. Although this can happen with witnesses for a wedding and it's not so far from that.
Re jury duty, my ideal would be to pull off a Henry Fonda, the lone "not guilty" hold-out against 11 people jumping to the conclusion that the dodgy looking geezer in the dock had dun it, who slowly but surely turns them all around with quiet, remorseless logic.
I am not suitable to serve, in other words.
I thought of doing a reverse Fonda. I was the ony guilty verdict and wondered if I could turn the other 11 around but it was a trivial case and I decided not to bother.
Really? You were 1 against 11? Gosh. That is uncomfortable.
I was two against ten. A late night punch up in a kebab shop. The evidence clearly pointed to guilty as charged but the rest of the jury clearly thought the case had been brought for bad reasons, that there was some blame on all sides (both probably true) and gave little weight to the police evidence.
At the time I was annoyed at having spent a whole week and arriving at the wrong answer. Looking back I am more sanguine and quite possibly the jury had a point in disregarding the strict technical question we were supposed to be answering and reaching a conclusion on wider grounds.
That's certainly one of the traditional defences of juries. They have the power and the right to look past the technicalities and take a broader view. I think I am right in saying that a lot of advances in our statutes are due to the reluctance of juries to convict where the punishment plainly didn't fit the crime. (Theft of bread and hands chopped off come to mind.)
Personally however I would convict anyone found in the vicinity of a kebab shop.
You clearly have not visited the correct type of kebab shop! There was a kebab wagon in a layby in Purton Road, just off Delta Business Park in Swindon who did one of the best donner kebabs with extra chilies and raw onions...... MMMmmmmmmmmmm!!!
We all seem to be quite down on people who clean toilets don't we? Toilet cleaning - tee hee. I am not sure why. Not only is it a vital job, it's a job which you can indeed do badly, indifferently, well, or superbly. You can also if you feel so inclined, take on another cleaner, and another, and build a multi-million pound facilities management empire - it's been done.
Quite so, and talking of underappreciated jobs I just received this rather touching email from a friend. I share it here to illustrate that it is not just NHS workers that we should be thanking:
" ....I bumped into the cashier at M&S I always liked - she's my age or younger, and yet her face was quite red, so I asked her how she was. She'd been in intensive care for a month, in a coma - on a ventilator. They weaned her off with oxygen and now she's home for a month, resting. She says her lungs are permanently damaged, and sometimes she can barely walk. Poor thing! She's glad to be alive ... how awful ... the price she has paid just to work at M&S. "
So if Robert Jenrick hadn't (unlawfully? illegally?) fast-tracked this decision, the taxpayer would be 45m+ quid better off?
Or to put it another way, Jenrick has more than undone all the work of Captain Tom in raising money?
Not quite it's £40m but yes...
Not just that.
If Jenrick had not approved the 1500 dwellings would not have been built for another 5-10 years, as is now going to happen. As the scheme would not have been viable, and TH had rejected it anyway.
Pros and cons.
Back to the drawing board for Desmond.
So Jenrick would have enabled 1500 families to get a home?
TH should be ashamed of themselves but instead of TH being attacked for NIMBYism people are attacking the only person to do the right thing.
Assuming that is what they would be used for.
In planning and property it always takes years to do anything. Gaining possession of a normal residential let can routinely take 5-6 months for the whole process if it needs the Court.
Moving a small business needs a planned time of 12-18 months. I did that a couple of years ago and industrial estate owners were seriously saying "sign a 10 year rental agreement and then we will build you a unit".
Creating a scheme and getting PP and building it can be anything from 2-15 years.
I rushed through a PP on a smallish - 100 unit 0 housing estate in 2013 to beat the deadline of a new local plan, then the land was sold to a developer with Outline PP in 2014. Otherwise it would have been wait until 2028 for the next cycle.
This is now 2020 and the entrance road has been built after 5 years of wrangles, and the Council still don't have an approved Local Plan. The latest lot started from scratch again last summer.
Separate from the Jenrick imbroglio, that's why "a million extra houses built in 5 years" claims are hilarious, and why I think the last 2-3 governments have done a decent job in increasing housebuilding just on the numbers, whatever we think of the planning reforms that they have used to do it.
and there are tons of unimplemented permissions, developers sitting on a lot of undeveloped land, and not much more than half of all permissions for new homes actually get built. Developers are to blame for the housing shortage, not the planning system. It is almost as if there is some reason why they might like there to be a shortage of supply.
It's more complex than that. The quota, and the mix, of new dwellings to be built is set by the Government and the Local Council via the Local Plan system, for example - not by the developer. And the habit of Councils is to make the number smaller not larger. I am not aware of any law that would stop them allowing more to be built.
And "unimplemented PP" is not purely a measure of developers sitting on undeveloped land, because a PP is not just about building it out; it is also (for example) about risk management - and there are plenty off PPs that are unbuildable, or become so due to circumstances.
For the one I mentioned above, no one would touch it until the land had at least Outline PP, which is the process for demonstrating that it is an acceptable and viable site and do risk management for the potential developer. What is the point of eg Barratt buying x acres of land to find that it is undevelopable for whatever reason - all they have done is tie up their capital, and shell out a set of transaction taxes, to no purpose?
So if Robert Jenrick hadn't (unlawfully? illegally?) fast-tracked this decision, the taxpayer would be 45m+ quid better off?
Or to put it another way, Jenrick has more than undone all the work of Captain Tom in raising money?
Not quite it's £40m but yes...
Not just that.
If Jenrick had not approved the 1500 dwellings would not have been built for another 5-10 years, as is now going to happen. As the scheme would not have been viable, and TH had rejected it anyway.
Pros and cons.
Back to the drawing board for Desmond.
So Jenrick would have enabled 1500 families to get a home?
TH should be ashamed of themselves but instead of TH being attacked for NIMBYism people are attacking the only person to do the right thing.
Once you start arguing that the ends justify the means you are on a slippery slope.
We either have laws and procedures that everyone is required to follow or you have laws and procedures that the powerful and wealthy can ignore when it suits them.
We have had two very well publicised cases (Cummings & Jenrick) during Johnson's first 6 months of office and the message seems clear, as far as this government is concerned the rules don't apply if your face fits.
I don't think the public care, they assume all politicians are corrupt and in it for themselves.
The law should apply to all equally.
The Police said Cummings transgression was so minor they'd not have even fined him so long as he listened to them, if he did break the law.
The law permits the Housing Secretary to approve housing developments and he has done so. I disagree with rescinding the approval but understand the requirement to appear whiter than white even if the law was followed.
No big deal in either case. People seeking to score partisan points on trivial bollocks rather than serious issues like this threads own topic. Abolishing trial by jury if it happens is disgusting and inexcusable and the government must fall if they do that. If they do that they'd lose my support immediately. This trivial petty point scoring - no thanks.
We all seem to be quite down on people who clean toilets don't we? Toilet cleaning - tee hee. I am not sure why. Not only is it a vital job, it's a job which you can indeed do badly, indifferently, well, or superbly. You can also if you feel so inclined, take on another cleaner, and another, and build a multi-million pound facilities management empire - it's been done.
Quite so, and talking of underappreciated jobs I just received this rather touching email from a friend. I share it here to illustrate that it is not just NHS workers that we should be thanking:
" ....I bumped into the cashier at M&S I always liked - she's my age or younger, and yet her face was quite red, so I asked her how she was. She'd been in intensive care for a month, in a coma - on a ventilator. They weaned her off with oxygen and now she's home for a month, resting. She says her lungs are permanently damaged, and sometimes she can barely walk. Poor thing! She's glad to be alive ... how awful ... the price she has paid just to work at M&S. "
We all seem to be quite down on people who clean toilets don't we? Toilet cleaning - tee hee. I am not sure why. Not only is it a vital job, it's a job which you can indeed do badly, indifferently, well, or superbly. You can also if you feel so inclined, take on another cleaner, and another, and build a multi-million pound facilities management empire - it's been done.
Quite so, and talking of underappreciated jobs I just received this rather touching email from a friend. I share it here to illustrate that it is not just NHS workers that we should be thanking:
" ....I bumped into the cashier at M&S I always liked - she's my age or younger, and yet her face was quite red, so I asked her how she was. She'd been in intensive care for a month, in a coma - on a ventilator. They weaned her off with oxygen and now she's home for a month, resting. She says her lungs are permanently damaged, and sometimes she can barely walk. Poor thing! She's glad to be alive ... how awful ... the price she has paid just to work at M&S. "
What sort of age would this lady be?
At a guess, 50.
I did not clap for the NHS, but I would have clapped for shop workers....
So if Robert Jenrick hadn't (unlawfully? illegally?) fast-tracked this decision, the taxpayer would be 45m+ quid better off?
Or to put it another way, Jenrick has more than undone all the work of Captain Tom in raising money?
Not quite it's £40m but yes...
Not just that.
If Jenrick had not approved the 1500 dwellings would not have been built for another 5-10 years, as is now going to happen. As the scheme would not have been viable, and TH had rejected it anyway.
Pros and cons.
Back to the drawing board for Desmond.
So Jenrick would have enabled 1500 families to get a home?
TH should be ashamed of themselves but instead of TH being attacked for NIMBYism people are attacking the only person to do the right thing.
Assuming that is what they would be used for.
In planning and property it always takes years to do anything. Gaining possession of a normal residential let can routinely take 5-6 months for the whole process if it needs the Court.
Moving a small business needs a planned time of 12-18 months. I did that a couple of years ago and industrial estate owners were seriously saying "sign a 10 year rental agreement and then we will build you a unit".
Creating a scheme and getting PP and building it can be anything from 2-15 years.
I rushed through a PP on a smallish - 100 unit 0 housing estate in 2013 to beat the deadline of a new local plan, then the land was sold to a developer with Outline PP in 2014. Otherwise it would have been wait until 2028 for the next cycle.
This is now 2020 and the entrance road has been built after 5 years of wrangles, and the Council still don't have an approved Local Plan. The latest lot started from scratch again last summer.
Separate from the Jenrick imbroglio, that's why "a million extra houses built in 5 years" claims are hilarious, and why I think the last 2-3 governments have done a decent job in increasing housebuilding just on the numbers, whatever we think of the planning reforms that they have used to do it.
and there are tons of unimplemented permissions, developers sitting on a lot of undeveloped land, and not much more than half of all permissions for new homes actually get built. Developers are to blame for the housing shortage, not the planning system. It is almost as if there is some reason why they might like there to be a shortage of supply.
Indeed. The number of new houses built is not really dependent upon the planning system at all but the demand for that housing that the economy is generating at any time. The reason that there have been quite good new build stats over the last several years is that we have had a buoyant employment market. One of the consequences of Covid will be a dramatic drop in the number of new houses being built.
The planning system doesn't exactly grease the system and causes delays in individual developments but it is not the driver or the brake on construction it is so often painted.
Doubt it. A lot of the new Tory MPs from the Blue Wall seats know their voters will have a fit if they vote for this. It will be seen as opening the door for the lone childrens' parents, siblings, uncles, aunties, first cousins etc to claim asylum
I wonder in what % of trials the judge privately disagrees with the verdict of the jury?
20% maybe?
Doesn't mean the judge is right though. Having been on a jury and been impressed at how seriously it took its duty I am a big fan of jury trials, they are a cornerstone of our justice system.
Certainly not arguing for a different system. Can't really think of a better one. I was just wondering how often the judge thinks "Oh, wow. Wasn't expecting that." Is it hardly at all - like 5% or so - or is it quite often, e.g. 15% 20% type thing?
I have never been called. A pity since I would like to do it - although not on a gory one.
I had the weirdest jury experience - I was visiting another city for the day and was approached by a policeman outside the county court and pressganged on the spot to join a jury to make up the numbers. I didn't even know that was possible.
I would not have thought so either. Although this can happen with witnesses for a wedding and it's not so far from that.
Re jury duty, my ideal would be to pull off a Henry Fonda, the lone "not guilty" hold-out against 11 people jumping to the conclusion that the dodgy looking geezer in the dock had dun it, who slowly but surely turns them all around with quiet, remorseless logic.
I am not suitable to serve, in other words.
I thought of doing a reverse Fonda. I was the ony guilty verdict and wondered if I could turn the other 11 around but it was a trivial case and I decided not to bother.
Really? You were 1 against 11? Gosh. That is uncomfortable.
I was two against ten. A late night punch up in a kebab shop. The evidence clearly pointed to guilty as charged but the rest of the jury clearly thought the case had been brought for bad reasons, that there was some blame on all sides (both probably true) and gave little weight to the police evidence.
At the time I was annoyed at having spent a whole week and arriving at the wrong answer. Looking back I am more sanguine and quite possibly the jury had a point in disregarding the strict technical question we were supposed to be answering and reaching a conclusion on wider grounds.
That's certainly one of the traditional defences of juries. They have the power and the right to look past the technicalities and take a broader view. I think I am right in saying that a lot of advances in our statutes are due to the reluctance of juries to convict where the punishment plainly didn't fit the crime. (Theft of bread and hands chopped off come to mind.)
Personally however I would convict anyone found in the vicinity of a kebab shop.
You clearly have not visited the correct type of kebab shop! There was a kebab wagon in a layby in Purton Road, just off Delta Business Park in Swindon who did one of the best donner kebabs with extra chilies and raw onions...... MMMmmmmmmmmmm!!!
Not only do you frequent Kebab shops, BC, but you admit to being in Swindon.
So if Robert Jenrick hadn't (unlawfully? illegally?) fast-tracked this decision, the taxpayer would be 45m+ quid better off?
Or to put it another way, Jenrick has more than undone all the work of Captain Tom in raising money?
Not quite it's £40m but yes...
Not just that.
If Jenrick had not approved the 1500 dwellings would not have been built for another 5-10 years, as is now going to happen. As the scheme would not have been viable, and TH had rejected it anyway.
Pros and cons.
Back to the drawing board for Desmond.
So Jenrick would have enabled 1500 families to get a home?
TH should be ashamed of themselves but instead of TH being attacked for NIMBYism people are attacking the only person to do the right thing.
Assuming that is what they would be used for.
In planning and property it always takes years to do anything. Gaining possession of a normal residential let can routinely take 5-6 months for the whole process if it needs the Court.
Moving a small business needs a planned time of 12-18 months. I did that a couple of years ago and industrial estate owners were seriously saying "sign a 10 year rental agreement and then we will build you a unit".
Creating a scheme and getting PP and building it can be anything from 2-15 years.
I rushed through a PP on a smallish - 100 unit 0 housing estate in 2013 to beat the deadline of a new local plan, then the land was sold to a developer with Outline PP in 2014. Otherwise it would have been wait until 2028 for the next cycle.
This is now 2020 and the entrance road has been built after 5 years of wrangles, and the Council still don't have an approved Local Plan. The latest lot started from scratch again last summer.
Separate from the Jenrick imbroglio, that's why "a million extra houses built in 5 years" claims are hilarious, and why I think the last 2-3 governments have done a decent job in increasing housebuilding just on the numbers, whatever we think of the planning reforms that they have used to do it.
Well indeed. The planning system is a monstrosity in this country and I will support any methods to simplify and streamline it. Including I would like to see the green belt abolished.
Let the market decide what houses are built. Then we'd get millions more and house prices would collapse and be affordable. Bloody NIMBYism is terrible for this country and shame on everyone jumping on this bandwagon for encouraging it.
We all seem to be quite down on people who clean toilets don't we? Toilet cleaning - tee hee. I am not sure why. Not only is it a vital job, it's a job which you can indeed do badly, indifferently, well, or superbly. You can also if you feel so inclined, take on another cleaner, and another, and build a multi-million pound facilities management empire - it's been done.
Quite so, and talking of underappreciated jobs I just received this rather touching email from a friend. I share it here to illustrate that it is not just NHS workers that we should be thanking:
" ....I bumped into the cashier at M&S I always liked - she's my age or younger, and yet her face was quite red, so I asked her how she was. She'd been in intensive care for a month, in a coma - on a ventilator. They weaned her off with oxygen and now she's home for a month, resting. She says her lungs are permanently damaged, and sometimes she can barely walk. Poor thing! She's glad to be alive ... how awful ... the price she has paid just to work at M&S. "
What sort of age would this lady be?
At a guess, 50.
A salutary reminder that even relatively young people can be really badly hit by this virus, and that the death statistics aren't the whole story.
Oh, look, it's another luvvie who's literally a communist. Do they grow them in a vat somewhere?
As a matter of interest do you have a preferred profession (other than acting) for people who take a dim view of capitalism?
Chartered surveyor perhaps? Something in retail?
Toilet cleaning?
There was a grim short period in Germany in the ?70s? when communists were banned from all public service jobs, such as being engine drivers or post office staff. It was rapidly seen as overreach and rescinded. (For clarity, I also don't see why someone with far-right views shouldn't be an engine-driver or a postman, so long as their private views don't affect how they work.)
I am beginning to regret this joke. I am sure that many toilet cleaners are extremely worthy people and contribute a great deal to society.
It's interesting how the "Israeli's do it" excuse winds its way through public discourse.
After De Mendes was shot - the police claimed "Israeli's do it like that". The Israelis pointed out that if they shot every suspected suicide bomber, they wouldn't have such a large collection of attempted suicide bombers in prison.
Is there nothing in it then, this "learnt from Mossad" business? I know there's much fevered nonsense around this topic but what about this specific claim?
Well, nothing but some pretty deep rooted anti-Semitism. But that's normal for people of that view, isn't it?
It is not normal, no. But it is there. At the last LP meeting I went to, there were around 6 (out of 25) there who I would describe as hard left and 2 of them seemed to me to be irrationally animated by any mention of Israel. Did not have sufficient discourse to 100% conclude a degree of antisemitism but one would not rule it out. In any case the mood was against them. And this was BEFORE Starmer took over.
However, there is a Mossad, and they do get up to stuff, so you can't just assume each and every accusation is a product of far left conspiracy guff even if most of it is. And I was just wondering about this one - have they provided training for US cops in techniques of restraint? Or is it a lurid invention?
I wonder in what % of trials the judge privately disagrees with the verdict of the jury?
20% maybe?
Doesn't mean the judge is right though. Having been on a jury and been impressed at how seriously it took its duty I am a big fan of jury trials, they are a cornerstone of our justice system.
Certainly not arguing for a different system. Can't really think of a better one. I was just wondering how often the judge thinks "Oh, wow. Wasn't expecting that." Is it hardly at all - like 5% or so - or is it quite often, e.g. 15% 20% type thing?
I have never been called. A pity since I would like to do it - although not on a gory one.
I had the weirdest jury experience - I was visiting another city for the day and was approached by a policeman outside the county court and pressganged on the spot to join a jury to make up the numbers. I didn't even know that was possible.
I would not have thought so either. Although this can happen with witnesses for a wedding and it's not so far from that.
Re jury duty, my ideal would be to pull off a Henry Fonda, the lone "not guilty" hold-out against 11 people jumping to the conclusion that the dodgy looking geezer in the dock had dun it, who slowly but surely turns them all around with quiet, remorseless logic.
I am not suitable to serve, in other words.
I thought of doing a reverse Fonda. I was the ony guilty verdict and wondered if I could turn the other 11 around but it was a trivial case and I decided not to bother.
Really? You were 1 against 11? Gosh. That is uncomfortable.
I was two against ten. A late night punch up in a kebab shop. The evidence clearly pointed to guilty as charged but the rest of the jury clearly thought the case had been brought for bad reasons, that there was some blame on all sides (both probably true) and gave little weight to the police evidence.
At the time I was annoyed at having spent a whole week and arriving at the wrong answer. Looking back I am more sanguine and quite possibly the jury had a point in disregarding the strict technical question we were supposed to be answering and reaching a conclusion on wider grounds.
That's certainly one of the traditional defences of juries. They have the power and the right to look past the technicalities and take a broader view. I think I am right in saying that a lot of advances in our statutes are due to the reluctance of juries to convict where the punishment plainly didn't fit the crime. (Theft of bread and hands chopped off come to mind.)
Personally however I would convict anyone found in the vicinity of a kebab shop.
Is that not problematical in the delivery of justice?
I am sorry once again to use the example of Alex Salmond, but my understanding of his trial is this - it came out as undeniably true (and admitted by his defence team?) that he behaved inappropriately with women who worked for him. I don't subscribe fully to all the tenets of the #Metoo movement, but since the inappropriate behaviour happened, and since it happened where Salmond was very clearly in a position of power over those women, the fact that he emerged from proceedings 'without a stain on his character', seems extraordinary. The suspicion cannot be dismissed that many in the jury went into the trial thinking this was an unfair attack on Salmond, or even an attack on Scotland, and nothing they heard during the trial was going to be enough to prevent them from 'sticking it to the man'.
Perhaps in the past, we had the sort of deferential society where jury duty was taken extremely seriously and people's political and other sensibilities were left at the door (though I doubt it was ever that different). But these days we certainly don't. We have suspicion on all sides of the political, social, and cultural spheres that 'the other side' aren't playing fair, so it would be daft is we were to do the same.
Saw this last night. So many people have similar views now - these aren't just nutters either, a lot are otherwise sensible professionals who've just gone down the youtube/facebook conspiracy rabbit hole.
So if Robert Jenrick hadn't (unlawfully? illegally?) fast-tracked this decision, the taxpayer would be 45m+ quid better off?
Or to put it another way, Jenrick has more than undone all the work of Captain Tom in raising money?
Not quite it's £40m but yes...
Not just that.
If Jenrick had not approved the 1500 dwellings would not have been built for another 5-10 years, as is now going to happen. As the scheme would not have been viable, and TH had rejected it anyway.
Pros and cons.
Back to the drawing board for Desmond.
So Jenrick would have enabled 1500 families to get a home?
TH should be ashamed of themselves but instead of TH being attacked for NIMBYism people are attacking the only person to do the right thing.
Assuming that is what they would be used for.
In planning and property it always takes years to do anything. Gaining possession of a normal residential let can routinely take 5-6 months for the whole process if it needs the Court.
Moving a small business needs a planned time of 12-18 months. I did that a couple of years ago and industrial estate owners were seriously saying "sign a 10 year rental agreement and then we will build you a unit".
Creating a scheme and getting PP and building it can be anything from 2-15 years.
I rushed through a PP on a smallish - 100 unit 0 housing estate in 2013 to beat the deadline of a new local plan, then the land was sold to a developer with Outline PP in 2014. Otherwise it would have been wait until 2028 for the next cycle.
This is now 2020 and the entrance road has been built after 5 years of wrangles, and the Council still don't have an approved Local Plan. The latest lot started from scratch again last summer.
Separate from the Jenrick imbroglio, that's why "a million extra houses built in 5 years" claims are hilarious, and why I think the last 2-3 governments have done a decent job in increasing housebuilding just on the numbers, whatever we think of the planning reforms that they have used to do it.
I agree completely that the planning system is in dire need of reform. That doesn't excuse what appears to be end runs around it. of dubious legality, by mates of those who are running the system.
Of course, any such thing is now about fiftieth on the government's (and probably the opposition's) list of priorities.
So if Robert Jenrick hadn't (unlawfully? illegally?) fast-tracked this decision, the taxpayer would be 45m+ quid better off?
Or to put it another way, Jenrick has more than undone all the work of Captain Tom in raising money?
Not quite it's £40m but yes...
Not just that.
If Jenrick had not approved the 1500 dwellings would not have been built for another 5-10 years, as is now going to happen. As the scheme would not have been viable, and TH had rejected it anyway.
Pros and cons.
Back to the drawing board for Desmond.
So Jenrick would have enabled 1500 families to get a home?
TH should be ashamed of themselves but instead of TH being attacked for NIMBYism people are attacking the only person to do the right thing.
Assuming that is what they would be used for.
In planning and property it always takes years to do anything. Gaining possession of a normal residential let can routinely take 5-6 months for the whole process if it needs the Court.
Moving a small business needs a planned time of 12-18 months. I did that a couple of years ago and industrial estate owners were seriously saying "sign a 10 year rental agreement and then we will build you a unit".
Creating a scheme and getting PP and building it can be anything from 2-15 years.
I rushed through a PP on a smallish - 100 unit 0 housing estate in 2013 to beat the deadline of a new local plan, then the land was sold to a developer with Outline PP in 2014. Otherwise it would have been wait until 2028 for the next cycle.
This is now 2020 and the entrance road has been built after 5 years of wrangles, and the Council still don't have an approved Local Plan. The latest lot started from scratch again last summer.
Separate from the Jenrick imbroglio, that's why "a million extra houses built in 5 years" claims are hilarious, and why I think the last 2-3 governments have done a decent job in increasing housebuilding just on the numbers, whatever we think of the planning reforms that they have used to do it.
Well indeed. The planning system is a monstrosity in this country and I will support any methods to simplify and streamline it. Including I would like to see the green belt abolished.
Let the market decide what houses are built. Then we'd get millions more and house prices would collapse and be affordable. Bloody NIMBYism is terrible for this country and shame on everyone jumping on this bandwagon for encouraging it.
I think that's a but too simplistic as well, and I think there are good things achieved by the PS in this country. Local communities do have a proper role in how their local community should develop, and a measure of regulation is good.
But I have things to do so I may argue that another time.
PS If you want to build a new house on a new site in open countryside for less than 500k, move to Scotland !
So if Robert Jenrick hadn't (unlawfully? illegally?) fast-tracked this decision, the taxpayer would be 45m+ quid better off?
Or to put it another way, Jenrick has more than undone all the work of Captain Tom in raising money?
Not quite it's £40m but yes...
Not just that.
If Jenrick had not approved the 1500 dwellings would not have been built for another 5-10 years, as is now going to happen. As the scheme would not have been viable, and TH had rejected it anyway.
Pros and cons.
Back to the drawing board for Desmond.
So Jenrick would have enabled 1500 families to get a home?
TH should be ashamed of themselves but instead of TH being attacked for NIMBYism people are attacking the only person to do the right thing.
Assuming that is what they would be used for.
In planning and property it always takes years to do anything. Gaining possession of a normal residential let can routinely take 5-6 months for the whole process if it needs the Court.
Moving a small business needs a planned time of 12-18 months. I did that a couple of years ago and industrial estate owners were seriously saying "sign a 10 year rental agreement and then we will build you a unit".
Creating a scheme and getting PP and building it can be anything from 2-15 years.
I rushed through a PP on a smallish - 100 unit 0 housing estate in 2013 to beat the deadline of a new local plan, then the land was sold to a developer with Outline PP in 2014. Otherwise it would have been wait until 2028 for the next cycle.
This is now 2020 and the entrance road has been built after 5 years of wrangles, and the Council still don't have an approved Local Plan. The latest lot started from scratch again last summer.
Separate from the Jenrick imbroglio, that's why "a million extra houses built in 5 years" claims are hilarious, and why I think the last 2-3 governments have done a decent job in increasing housebuilding just on the numbers, whatever we think of the planning reforms that they have used to do it.
and there are tons of unimplemented permissions, developers sitting on a lot of undeveloped land, and not much more than half of all permissions for new homes actually get built. Developers are to blame for the housing shortage, not the planning system. It is almost as if there is some reason why they might like there to be a shortage of supply.
Indeed. The number of new houses built is not really dependent upon the planning system at all but the demand for that housing that the economy is generating at any time. The reason that there have been quite good new build stats over the last several years is that we have had a buoyant employment market. One of the consequences of Covid will be a dramatic drop in the number of new houses being built.
The planning system doesn't exactly grease the system and causes delays in individual developments but it is not the driver or the brake on construction it is so often painted.
Sure it is. It holds things up for years and is a major impediment to a free market.
The two issues reinforce each other. In a proper free market with easy to achieve planning if a developer got planning for required housing but sat on it then a rival developer would acquire planning just as easily and then beat them to the punch.
Instead due to the planning system being the monstrosity is developers actually view having permission to be valuable in and of itself even without actually building anything. If you own vacant land with permission you can look to resell that without even building anything and turn a profit on simply gaining permission even without doing anything. That is a farcical system.
Due to our planning system simply having consent is regarded as value added even if you don't do anything. If the system was streamlined and fast and easy to navigate that would not be the case!
I have served once on a jury and foreman (foreperson?) at that. The case involved an alleged attack on a police officer. The barrister for the defence was very good; that for the prosecution pretty rubbish. After considerable discussion I called a preliminary vote. It was 6-6. Further discussion - still the same result. Reported to the judge who thanked us then dismissed us. I later found out it was a re-trial as the original jury could not make up its mind. Really felt like a waste of time.
Doesn't sound like a waste of time to me. Seems more like the system working as it should.
Coincidentally when I was a foreman the opening vote was 6-6 but after an hour or so of sensible discussion we got a unanimous. Judge agreed with us too so we were all happy with that.
It's been interesting to read the jury posts here today. My overall impression is that experiences and outcomes vary widely but the system is basically ok.
We all seem to be quite down on people who clean toilets don't we? Toilet cleaning - tee hee. I am not sure why. Not only is it a vital job, it's a job which you can indeed do badly, indifferently, well, or superbly. You can also if you feel so inclined, take on another cleaner, and another, and build a multi-million pound facilities management empire - it's been done.
You are unlikely to get paid to clean toilets superbly, unless you work for a high end hotel perhaps. I have cleaned toilets professionally and if I'd taken the time to clean them superbly I would have been told off for wasting my time when I had other things to be getting on with.
I've cleaned toilets too, as part of another job. How you would be a 'superb' cleaner (I have come across many, and I certainly was not in the superb category) would be to complete your tasks efficiently within the time allocated (even reducing the time allocated) but do a great job within that framework. Someone who spend an hour polishing a loo wouldn't be doing a superb job.
I wonder in what % of trials the judge privately disagrees with the verdict of the jury?
20% maybe?
Doesn't mean the judge is right though. Having been on a jury and been impressed at how seriously it took its duty I am a big fan of jury trials, they are a cornerstone of our justice system.
Certainly not arguing for a different system. Can't really think of a better one. I was just wondering how often the judge thinks "Oh, wow. Wasn't expecting that." Is it hardly at all - like 5% or so - or is it quite often, e.g. 15% 20% type thing?
I have never been called. A pity since I would like to do it - although not on a gory one.
I had the weirdest jury experience - I was visiting another city for the day and was approached by a policeman outside the county court and pressganged on the spot to join a jury to make up the numbers. I didn't even know that was possible.
I would not have thought so either. Although this can happen with witnesses for a wedding and it's not so far from that.
Re jury duty, my ideal would be to pull off a Henry Fonda, the lone "not guilty" hold-out against 11 people jumping to the conclusion that the dodgy looking geezer in the dock had dun it, who slowly but surely turns them all around with quiet, remorseless logic.
I am not suitable to serve, in other words.
I thought of doing a reverse Fonda. I was the ony guilty verdict and wondered if I could turn the other 11 around but it was a trivial case and I decided not to bother.
Really? You were 1 against 11? Gosh. That is uncomfortable.
I was two against ten. A late night punch up in a kebab shop. The evidence clearly pointed to guilty as charged but the rest of the jury clearly thought the case had been brought for bad reasons, that there was some blame on all sides (both probably true) and gave little weight to the police evidence.
At the time I was annoyed at having spent a whole week and arriving at the wrong answer. Looking back I am more sanguine and quite possibly the jury had a point in disregarding the strict technical question we were supposed to be answering and reaching a conclusion on wider grounds.
That's certainly one of the traditional defences of juries. They have the power and the right to look past the technicalities and take a broader view. I think I am right in saying that a lot of advances in our statutes are due to the reluctance of juries to convict where the punishment plainly didn't fit the crime. (Theft of bread and hands chopped off come to mind.)
Personally however I would convict anyone found in the vicinity of a kebab shop.
You clearly have not visited the correct type of kebab shop! There was a kebab wagon in a layby in Purton Road, just off Delta Business Park in Swindon who did one of the best donner kebabs with extra chilies and raw onions...... MMMmmmmmmmmmm!!!
Not only do you frequent Kebab shops, BC, but you admit to being in Swindon.
Have you no shame?
I frequented it for 18 months, but then the contract ended
Shrewd of Starmer to put her in a high profile role, knowing she'd make this kind of mistake so he would be able to look strong in dismissing her. In no way a poor appointment or bad judgement on his part
You'd have thought that, with a majority of 80 to start with, even Boris can't mess up that badly.
However.
In some ways, a landslide makes party management harder; individuals can rebel with nothing long-term bad happening to the government programme, which can be a bad habit to get into. (Didn't someone get into trouble for pointing out the problems with landslides during one of Maggie's elections?).
The other problem is that the MPs to baubles ratio gets worse as the majority goes up. There are a lot of MPs who are simply not going to get anywhere near promotions in this parliament; beyond a certain point, there's less point in being a good little MP, because you will get nothing in return. So "Outspoken Backbench Critic standing up for Doing the Right Thing For Mytown North " becomes a more viable career move.
And if nobody is going to resign, ever, there are fewer promotion opportunities.
That's before you get onto the backbencher looking into their own eyes as they shave, wondering if supporting this sort of thing is really what they want to do with their life.
So the probability of collapse is probably low, but further from zero than it ought to be.
"Only in Brixton, you’ll see feds getting run out of the area" gloat the BLM supporters, as gangs with swords and hammers injure 15 policemen, put 2 in hospital and smash up their cars
This photo is going to haunt Starmer. it can be appended to any story where reality intrudes rudely on woke dogma - which will be most stories, of course.
I just built my first Hackintosh, using an Intel NUC. And despite hearing from everyone how incredibly difficult it would be, it seem sot be working fine off just a couple of hours of work.
Macs will use ARM-based Apple processors instead of Intel -- is Hackintosh dead?
Today at WWDC 2020, Apple confirmed the rumors -- the company is ditching Intel processors for future Mac computers. While there are technically still some future Intel-powered Macs in the pipeline, Apple intends to eventually switch to its own in-house chips exclusively.
Under no circumstances should trial by jury be limited or end. None whatsoever. No if's, no buts.
There are zero grounds I would support this on and if the government proposes this I would be disgusted. Hopefully this is a kite quickly shot down this must not happen.
Financial crimes should be in front of an expert tribunal
Under no circumstances should trial by jury be limited or end. None whatsoever. No if's, no buts.
There are zero grounds I would support this on and if the government proposes this I would be disgusted. Hopefully this is a kite quickly shot down this must not happen.
Financial crimes should be in front of an expert tribunal
No they should be put in front of a jury but arguably with a right for the defendant to then appeal to an expert tribunal if they're convicted.
Better for ten guilty men to walk free than one innocent to be wrongly convicted. The right to a jury trial should never be qualified.
The problem is that most juries don’t understand financial crimes. They try to get round it with allocating expert jurors but it’s hard.
Thanks Cyclefree. This is the sort of topic I enjoy very much.
One problem you might have in your defence of the current jury system is that many of us have sat on juries. Whilst my own experiences did not make we wish to abolish trial by jury, they did make me think there is a lot wrong with them that could and should be addressed. The list is long so I'll stick to one fairly uncontroversial question.
Why does it have to be 12 jurors? What is special about that number? why not, say, 10, or perhaps the 7 that others have suggested?
And if I may be allowed a supplementary.... What is wrong with having specialist jurors for certain types of trial where specialist knowledge would be a distinct advantage? I am thinking particularly of fraud or similar financial offences where the technicalities may be beyond most people but straight forward enough for people with a financial background. Why would it be wrong for the jury to ;know its subject'?
Got to go out for a bit but back in about an hour.
I strongly disagree with you and @Charles on this and having done quite a few of the biggest and most complicated fraud and financial trials around, I’ll tell you why.
It is precisely the lack of specialist knowledge which is an advantage, the ability not to be blinded by your belief that you understand all this because you’re an expert. And that’s because the issue is not the complicated financial stuff but whether someone is dishonest or not, whether they’re lying or bullshitting etc - all the issues which come up in every trial. And ordinary people are as good, often better, than specialists at seeing through the bullshit, at assessing whether someone is lying or not.
Take one case - the Adoboli case: lots of people with oh so much specialist knowledge believed him and could not see what the jury clearly saw - that he was a lying bullshitter who had no answer to the simple question: if what he was doing was sanctioned by his bosses, as he claimed (untrue) why did he go to such lengths to hide what he was doing.
The lawyers’ job is to explain the complicated simply. Believe me - there is nothing, absolutely nothing, in this world so complicated that someone cannot explain it simply. That is what the lawyers have to do.
So I don’t buy this stuff about financial crimes being too complicated for ordinary people. That is simply making exactly the mistake I describe - thinking that only clever people can understand this. It was clever people who made the mistakes. Ordinary people are well able to see what clever people, blinded by their own cleverness, often miss.
OK, but consider the following anecdote.
A friend sat on a long, complicated fraud trial for about three weeks. At the end, the foreman announced the jury's verdict of 'Not guilty' to which the judge responded 'Well I am surprised!' To his eternal credit the foreman said 'Well you shouldn't be. We've listened for three weeks and haven't understood a word'.
I was reminded of this when the Maxwell brothers stood trial. I recall that their defence rested mainly if not wholly on the argument that although they were directors of the businesses in question they hadn't a clue what was going on because it was all run by their Dad. Now I always thought that directors were responsible for everything that went on in a company and that you couldn't plead ignorance like that, so I couldn't help suspecting that the jury had so little acquaintance with company law and the management of businesses that they accepted the Maxwells' excuse and found them not guilty. In other words, they didn't understand what was going on so they found them not guilty.
You get my point?
I do. I was involved in the Maxwell case. You see you are making the sort of mistake that someone with a little expertise might well make. The test in a criminal trial is different to the issue of a director’s legal responsibility. There is a different standard of proof, for one thing, and the issue was not their role as directors. It was whether they had a reasonable belief that, when the company used the assets of the pension fund as collateral for the loans from banks, they would be able to repay those loans. And the evidence was that they did have a reasonable belief for this. They were not charged with theft of various sums where the evidence was much more conclusive but with a rather more obscure charge and the evidence simply was not up to snuff.
So knowing about directors’ legal duties does not really help you all that much and might actually distract you from focusing on what the issues in the particular case are.
Expertise is not a bar to being on a jury but it is not the be all and end all.
Could the charges relating to theft to which you allude in the Maxwell case have been pursued following the trial? I am aware that the accused cannot be tried for the same offence after a verdict has been delivered, but surely that would not be a bar to a new charge which the jury had not previously been invited to consider?
Yes - but after the first trial the judge ruled that there should be no further trials.
We all seem to be quite down on people who clean toilets don't we? Toilet cleaning - tee hee. I am not sure why. Not only is it a vital job, it's a job which you can indeed do badly, indifferently, well, or superbly. You can also if you feel so inclined, take on another cleaner, and another, and build a multi-million pound facilities management empire - it's been done.
That is one example of aspiration and it's a good one. But what about working instead to bring down the system that has brought you to such a sorry pass? Is this not aspiration too?
On topic, I agree with most of the thread header. One quibble I would make is about very complex fraud trials, although obviously(!) this is an area where I am much less expert than she is.
I seem to remember the catalyst for change there was a trial that lasted for over three years, then collapsed because the jury withdrew. By that time, they had all of course lost their jobs, and given the rather paltry fee that was earned for sitting on cases had suffered considerable financial hardship. For nothing.
So the Blair Government, for whom civil liberties were always of course at best a minor consideration, made fraud trials the preserve of specialist tribunals. Whether that was done out of a genuine desire to resolve matters so ordinary people would not have to suffer injustice, or because they were crooks who wanted the ‘right’ verdict, is of course a different question.
The obvious solution to that would be to have a few - say, a couple of hundred - professional jurors, who would be paid a salary and hear such cases as their main role. It could be attractive to older people, shortly to retire, and run for a maximum of say, seven years (and then the conclusion of the case at the time) so you get reasonable churn.
But on the main point, any step to get rid of juries is outrageous. It would be bad enough in a justice system we could trust. In he British system, it would be horrendous.
Blair tried to do this but was forced to retreat. There were some Labour MPs with principles and the Tories opposed him. Current Tory MPs won’t have the balls or principles to do anything other than go along with whatever malicious rubbish is put in front of them.
I wonder in what % of trials the judge privately disagrees with the verdict of the jury?
20% maybe?
Doesn't mean the judge is right though. Having been on a jury and been impressed at how seriously it took its duty I am a big fan of jury trials, they are a cornerstone of our justice system.
Certainly not arguing for a different system. Can't really think of a better one. I was just wondering how often the judge thinks "Oh, wow. Wasn't expecting that." Is it hardly at all - like 5% or so - or is it quite often, e.g. 15% 20% type thing?
I have never been called. A pity since I would like to do it - although not on a gory one.
I had the weirdest jury experience - I was visiting another city for the day and was approached by a policeman outside the county court and pressganged on the spot to join a jury to make up the numbers. I didn't even know that was possible.
I would not have thought so either. Although this can happen with witnesses for a wedding and it's not so far from that.
Re jury duty, my ideal would be to pull off a Henry Fonda, the lone "not guilty" hold-out against 11 people jumping to the conclusion that the dodgy looking geezer in the dock had dun it, who slowly but surely turns them all around with quiet, remorseless logic.
I am not suitable to serve, in other words.
I thought of doing a reverse Fonda. I was the ony guilty verdict and wondered if I could turn the other 11 around but it was a trivial case and I decided not to bother.
Really? You were 1 against 11? Gosh. That is uncomfortable.
I was two against ten. A late night punch up in a kebab shop. The evidence clearly pointed to guilty as charged but the rest of the jury clearly thought the case had been brought for bad reasons, that there was some blame on all sides (both probably true) and gave little weight to the police evidence.
At the time I was annoyed at having spent a whole week and arriving at the wrong answer. Looking back I am more sanguine and quite possibly the jury had a point in disregarding the strict technical question we were supposed to be answering and reaching a conclusion on wider grounds.
That's certainly one of the traditional defences of juries. They have the power and the right to look past the technicalities and take a broader view. I think I am right in saying that a lot of advances in our statutes are due to the reluctance of juries to convict where the punishment plainly didn't fit the crime. (Theft of bread and hands chopped off come to mind.)
Personally however I would convict anyone found in the vicinity of a kebab shop.
You clearly have not visited the correct type of kebab shop! There was a kebab wagon in a layby in Purton Road, just off Delta Business Park in Swindon who did one of the best donner kebabs with extra chilies and raw onions...... MMMmmmmmmmmmm!!!
Not only do you frequent Kebab shops, BC, but you admit to being in Swindon.
It's interesting how the "Israeli's do it" excuse winds its way through public discourse.
After De Mendes was shot - the police claimed "Israeli's do it like that". The Israelis pointed out that if they shot every suspected suicide bomber, they wouldn't have such a large collection of attempted suicide bombers in prison.
Supporter of Jeremy Corbyn attacks Israelis. Of course, Mr Corbyn and his friends were/are not really anti_Semites. It is always Israel that is used as an example of brutality by them. Left wing regimes can do what they want. And the quasi-fascist regime of Putin - an odd silence. Fecking hypocrites. I might loathe Johnson and his extreme thicko Brexit backers, but I really do hate the hypocritical left of Jeremy Corbyn
But you have to choose between them. FPTP insists. Decide NOW.
Comments
At the time I was annoyed at having spent a whole week and arriving at the wrong answer. Looking back I am more sanguine and quite possibly the jury had a point in disregarding the strict technical question we were supposed to be answering and reaching a conclusion on wider grounds.
Would be my prediction there.
In planning and property it always takes years to do anything. Gaining possession of a normal residential let can routinely take 5-6 months for the whole process if it needs the Court.
Moving a small business needs a planned time of 12-18 months. I did that a couple of years ago and industrial estate owners were seriously saying "sign a 10 year rental agreement and then we will build you a unit".
Creating a scheme and getting PP and building it can be anything from 2-15 years.
I rushed through a PP on a smallish - 100 unit 0 housing estate in 2013 to beat the deadline of a new local plan, then the land was sold to a developer with Outline PP in 2014. Otherwise it would have been wait until 2028 for the next cycle.
This is now 2020 and the entrance road has been built after 5 years of wrangles, and the Council still don't have an approved Local Plan. The latest lot started from scratch again last summer.
Separate from the Jenrick imbroglio, that's why "a million extra houses built in 5 years" claims are hilarious, and why I think the last 2-3 governments have done a decent job in increasing housebuilding just on the numbers, whatever we think of the planning reforms that they have used to do it.
I guess we'll never know.
No jury trials for her
Personally however I would convict anyone found in the vicinity of a kebab shop.
Singapore’s biggest telecom operators Singtel and StarHub have chosen Ericsson and Nokia as their main 5G network provider
https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/southeast-asia/article/3090519/huawei-loses-out-singapore-telecom-operators-choose-5g
Ended up as a not proven - good example of the use of that verdict I think. I'd have probably gone not guilty otherwise, but likely nobody else would have.
" ....I bumped into the cashier at M&S I always liked - she's my age or younger, and yet her face was quite red, so I asked her how she was. She'd been in intensive care for a month, in a coma - on a ventilator. They weaned her off with oxygen and now she's home for a month, resting. She says her lungs are permanently damaged, and sometimes she can barely walk. Poor thing! She's glad to be alive ... how awful ... the price she has paid just to work at M&S. "
https://twitter.com/Steven_Swinford/status/1276097682273177601
And "unimplemented PP" is not purely a measure of developers sitting on undeveloped land, because a PP is not just about building it out; it is also (for example) about risk management - and there are plenty off PPs that are unbuildable, or become so due to circumstances.
For the one I mentioned above, no one would touch it until the land had at least Outline PP, which is the process for demonstrating that it is an acceptable and viable site and do risk management for the potential developer. What is the point of eg Barratt buying x acres of land to find that it is undevelopable for whatever reason - all they have done is tie up their capital, and shell out a set of transaction taxes, to no purpose?
The Police said Cummings transgression was so minor they'd not have even fined him so long as he listened to them, if he did break the law.
The law permits the Housing Secretary to approve housing developments and he has done so. I disagree with rescinding the approval but understand the requirement to appear whiter than white even if the law was followed.
No big deal in either case. People seeking to score partisan points on trivial bollocks rather than serious issues like this threads own topic. Abolishing trial by jury if it happens is disgusting and inexcusable and the government must fall if they do that. If they do that they'd lose my support immediately. This trivial petty point scoring - no thanks.
The planning system doesn't exactly grease the system and causes delays in individual developments but it is not the driver or the brake on construction it is so often painted.
Have you no shame?
Let the market decide what houses are built. Then we'd get millions more and house prices would collapse and be affordable. Bloody NIMBYism is terrible for this country and shame on everyone jumping on this bandwagon for encouraging it.
However, there is a Mossad, and they do get up to stuff, so you can't just assume each and every accusation is a product of far left conspiracy guff even if most of it is. And I was just wondering about this one - have they provided training for US cops in techniques of restraint? Or is it a lurid invention?
I am sorry once again to use the example of Alex Salmond, but my understanding of his trial is this - it came out as undeniably true (and admitted by his defence team?) that he behaved inappropriately with women who worked for him. I don't subscribe fully to all the tenets of the #Metoo movement, but since the inappropriate behaviour happened, and since it happened where Salmond was very clearly in a position of power over those women, the fact that he emerged from proceedings 'without a stain on his character', seems extraordinary. The suspicion cannot be dismissed that many in the jury went into the trial thinking this was an unfair attack on Salmond, or even an attack on Scotland, and nothing they heard during the trial was going to be enough to prevent them from 'sticking it to the man'.
Perhaps in the past, we had the sort of deferential society where jury duty was taken extremely seriously and people's political and other sensibilities were left at the door (though I doubt it was ever that different). But these days we certainly don't. We have suspicion on all sides of the political, social, and cultural spheres that 'the other side' aren't playing fair, so it would be daft is we were to do the same.
https://twitter.com/gsoh31/status/1276095791866818560?s=20
That doesn't excuse what appears to be end runs around it. of dubious legality, by mates of those who are running the system.
Of course, any such thing is now about fiftieth on the government's (and probably the opposition's) list of priorities.
But I have things to do so I may argue that another time.
PS If you want to build a new house on a new site in open countryside for less than 500k, move to Scotland !
Why their political opinions are deemed worthy of note is a puzzle, though.
http://www.brixtonbuzz.com/2020/06/brixton-black-lives-matter-live-music-protest-windrush-square-weds-24th-june-2020/
The two issues reinforce each other. In a proper free market with easy to achieve planning if a developer got planning for required housing but sat on it then a rival developer would acquire planning just as easily and then beat them to the punch.
Instead due to the planning system being the monstrosity is developers actually view having permission to be valuable in and of itself even without actually building anything. If you own vacant land with permission you can look to resell that without even building anything and turn a profit on simply gaining permission even without doing anything. That is a farcical system.
Due to our planning system simply having consent is regarded as value added even if you don't do anything. If the system was streamlined and fast and easy to navigate that would not be the case!
Coincidentally when I was a foreman the opening vote was 6-6 but after an hour or so of sensible discussion we got a unanimous. Judge agreed with us too so we were all happy with that.
It's been interesting to read the jury posts here today. My overall impression is that experiences and outcomes vary widely but the system is basically ok.
Am I doing this right?
However.
In some ways, a landslide makes party management harder; individuals can rebel with nothing long-term bad happening to the government programme, which can be a bad habit to get into. (Didn't someone get into trouble for pointing out the problems with landslides during one of Maggie's elections?).
The other problem is that the MPs to baubles ratio gets worse as the majority goes up. There are a lot of MPs who are simply not going to get anywhere near promotions in this parliament; beyond a certain point, there's less point in being a good little MP, because you will get nothing in return. So "Outspoken Backbench Critic standing up for Doing the Right Thing For Mytown North " becomes a more viable career move.
And if nobody is going to resign, ever, there are fewer promotion opportunities.
That's before you get onto the backbencher looking into their own eyes as they shave, wondering if supporting this sort of thing is really what they want to do with their life.
So the probability of collapse is probably low, but further from zero than it ought to be.
New Kebab and Jury Trial
https://twitter.com/ExStrategist/status/1276103796838617088?s=20
https://twitter.com/ExStrategist/status/1276104113315631105?s=20