Debbie Purdy has won her battle to have the law on assisted suicide clarified. This is being reported in many places as if she ‘has won her right to die battle’. This is misleading, for so so many reasons. Firstly, I don’t believe it’s actually illegal to die: I’m not aware of any governments actually [...]

Now I wouldn’t say that I’ve generally got draconian attitudes towards crime and punishment. I would feel that I would tend to punish crimes of fear, violence and intimidation, and crimes against a specific individual more harshly than I would want to punish other sorts of crimes, or those against a company or organisation. There [...]

…in related news, David Davis MP comes over as a thoroughly reasonable chap. By some rather bizarre leap of logic, Derek Barnett, vice president of the Police Superintendents’ Association of England and Wales, says about the police violence reported and the general unease with the policing methods that… we ought to put that in some [...]

The policing of the G20 has caused a lot of news coverage. Firstly, there’s the Ian Tomlinson affair, and the way the Metropolitan Police appear to have tried to deal with this by throwing up a smokescreen to attempt to put themselves in a good light, irrespective of what actually happened. There was no mention [...]

What happens if you insult and abuse the Metropolitan Police? Yes, that’s right. The Metropolitan Police choose to silence dissent by clubbing people with a baton. Argumentative people, yes. Trouble-making people, yes. But non-violent people. Was there a danger of injury to anyone? Not until the policeman attacked the protester. This was of course a [...]

I’ll start with the Daily Mail, which I’d normally take the trouble to disagree with. However, I’m big enough to overcome my innate prejudice against them when they say something I agree with, and in relation to whether or not Ian Tomlinson had been drinking, the Daily Mail hit the nail on the head. And [...]

I have no doubt that you will already be aware by now that Ian Tomlinson, who was simply walking home from work, not being disruptive, and not attacking the police or anyone else in any way whatsoever, and simply strolling along with his hands in his pockets was viciously shoved to the ground by a [...]

I was a little concerned to hear today that: Sex offenders will be made to take lie detector tests as part of probation conditions when they are freed from prison, the Ministry of Justice says. BBC News: Lie tests tried on sex offenders Firstly, before I explain, I will qualify. I am not against people [...]

Given that Stephen Clarke was arrested under Prevention of Terrorism legislation for taking photos of a sewer drain, on the basis that this information “may be useful to terrorists”, I was wondering whether the executives of Google are going to be arrested and DNA swabbed… Why? Well it appears to me that with Google Street [...]

Many of you will already be aware of this, but I make no apologies for mentioning it. I think it’s important, and I think — at the risk of sounding like someone writing into the Daily Mail — that something must be done. I presume someone like Mark Thomas will be planning some sort of [...]