I wrote at Comment is Free yesterday, defending the government’s proposals on retention of DNA profiles in the Crime and Security Bill, and generally arguing against the idea that profile retention is a major invasion of human rights:

… much […]

I may have been less visible than usual here recently, but that’s not been simple idleness – and I have been writing elsewhere, including this piece the other week on Index on Censorship about Jon Venables. I was a […]

I’m sorry it’s taken me so long to comment on the Court of Appeal’s judgment in R(Mohamed) v Foreign Secretary. People usually claim to hate saying they told you so. I love saying it if I’m honest, but only […]

It’s not often health and safety law is big news – but it has been in Australia this month, as a result of the judgment of the High Court of Australia in the Kirk case.

Graeme Kirk was director […]

Last night Charon QC interviewed me about Iraq, international law and Lord Goldsmith’s evidence to the Iraq inquiry. We discussed Lord Goldsmith’s “revival” theory and the meaning of resolution 1441, plus the relevance of negotiators’ views and propriety of […]

This blog didn’t exist when US and British forces, with others, invaded Iraq in 2003. I’ve never written directly about the legality of the war. But with Sir Michael Wood and Elizabeth Wilmshurst having given evidence to the Iraq inquiry […]

A lot of the talk about the release of Munir Hussain, the law of self-defence and the functioning of the courts this week has missed several points. Why, people ask, didn’t the judges take account of the anguish Hussain […]

On Wednesday I wrote about the Nadia Eweida case at Comment is Free.

My line’s a compromise one, I think: my starting point is a secularist one, but I’m not insisting on the workspace being absolutely non-religious. I doubt that’s […]

While the British government bans Islamist groups, it looks very much as though some kind of ban is going to be imposed in France on being completely veiled – wearing the niqab, chador and burka – in public. A

In case you’re interested, here’s the order, made under section 3(6) of the Terrorism Act 2000, by means of which Alan Johnson has banned “Islam4UK” under several alternative names. The Order was made on Monday, which suggests it was […]