Written on October 13th, 2009 by adminno shouts
It is sometimes hard to remember that we live in a democracy. There are plenty of examples where government appears not to listen to public opinion and does whatever it wants regardless but at least we usually know what they have done.
The Guardian is reporting that it has been prevented from writing about a question due to be asked in the Houses of Parliament by a gagging order in which somebody, or some company, has got a court to prevent the newspaper reporting on what is happening in Parliament. No matter that you elect these people to act on your behalf. It seems that a company or individual is able to prevent us knowing what is being said.
The Guardian reports that:-
Today’s published Commons order papers contain a question to be answered by a minister later this week. The Guardian is prevented from identifying the MP who has asked the question, what the question is, which minister might answer it, or where the question is to be found.
The Guardian is also forbidden from telling its readers why the paper is prevented – for the first time in memory – from reporting parliament. Legal obstacles, which cannot be identified, involve proceedings, which cannot be mentioned, on behalf of a client who must remain secret.
The only fact the Guardian can report is that the case involves the London solicitors Carter-Ruck, who specialise in suing the media for clients, who include individuals or global corporations.
Members of Parliament are protected and can basically say whatever they want in Parliament without fear of prosecution but it does seem ridiculous that in a democracy we are prevented from knowing what they say.
Presumably we will eventually get to hear about it one way or another but this seems to stink whichever way you look at it.
** UPDATE **
The Guardian has just announced that the ban on publishing has been lifted since lawyers acting on behalf of clients have given up their attempts to prevent the reporting of Parliamentary business.
The Guardian now reports that the question to be asked in parliament is the following one from Labour MP Paul Farrelly:-
“To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of legislation to protect (a) whistleblowers and (b) press freedom following the injunctions obtained in the High Court by (i) Barclays and Freshfields solicitors on 19 March 2009 on the publication of internal Barclays reports documenting alleged tax avoidance schemes and (ii) Trafigura and Carter-Ruck solicitors on 11 September 2009 on the publication of the Minton report on the alleged dumping of toxic waste in the Ivory Coast, commissioned by Trafigura.”
This will be a feather in the cap of Guido Fawkes who had correctly assumed this was the question that was being blocked from publication.here
Written on September 28th, 2009 by adminno shouts
Two female police officers who previously had an arrangement whereby each would babysit for the other when they were working has been stopped by Ofsted under the Childcare Act 2006.
Officers representing Ofsted knocked at the door of one of the women and informed her that they had become aware she might be running an illegal childcare service. She, as any normal person would, thought that this was clearly a misunderstanding and invited the officers in to explain. Even after fully explaining the situation she was told that to continue their arrangement they would both need to become registered childminders and pass all appropriate tests or face prosecution.
To become a registered childminder is not a simple process of simply checking you are a decent person. There are all sorts of rules and regulations to follow and I know personally one lady who gave up because she got fed up with being required to follow what seems like silly rules such as having enough black as well as white dolls and having to follow irritatingly complicated procedures with the ever present fear of an ofsted inspection at any time. I guess if you are running a childminding nursery looking after dozens of children it all makes sense but for one or two children it seems excessive.
The problem for the two police officers was that the exchange of service for each other has been considered to be a ‘reward’ by the Ofsted officers which is a reasonable thing to decide since there clearly is a reward in that they each help out the other.
The law was clearly never intended to stop people babyminding for close friends under such an arrangement and Vernon Coaker the Minister for Children, Schools and Families is speaking to Ofsted about the interpretation of the word ‘reward’. It is hard to see how they could interpret it any other way than that which they have done and all they are doing is enforcing the law as it stands.
This would seem to be another example of a law rushed through parliament with the best of intentions but without the appropriate time spent on it to ensure it does what it is supposed to do. In this case that was to protect children and parents from dodgy childminders but it was surely never intended to stop the practice of babyminding for friends now and again to earn a few pounds or in an exchange of service by friends.
It is a worrying thought that there may be dozens more laws that have been rushed through parliament in recent years that are full of careless errors such as this and that ordinary decent and honest people may well suffer for the lack of care taken.
Apparently this does not apply to anyone looking after the children in their parents home so employing a schoolgirl or friend to regularly babysit to allow the parents to have a break and earn a few pounds is not affected by this law.
