John Hemming's Web Log

The normal phrase is "its the economy stupid". However, unless a country is an energy exporter in a large way in fact "its energy prices stupid". I have obtained figures from the Library to calculate the marginal rate at which an increase in the price of energy reduces economic activity. I did speak about this in the house earlier this year. However, I haven't yet found the time to do the analysis. It remains, however, that as energy prices (and particularly oil prices as that is the marginal source of energy) go up then economic activity is held back. We make the mistake thinking of growth rather than activity. Obviously some forms of economic activity use less energy than other forms. In a world with a constrained energy supply those forms of economic activity need to be encouraged. You will see on the right of my blog a couple of charts. It is possible to see the effect on oil prices in the USA of Shale Gas (it has knocked about USD 20 off a barrel ...

This Story about Samsung shares dropping following a patent case highlights some interesting questions. I haven't studied the details of the cases around the world, but superficially it appears that the US Courts have found for Apple and non-US courts have found for Samsung. If this is true then in itself it raises questions about the differential effect of the rule of law in different countries. I do study this for the purposes of family law as should become clear in a few days. However, it is not something we can ignore as if it stands up to detailed scrutiny - which of course it might not - it raises concerns about the enforcement of court orders from one country in another. The activity of Argentina in the energy sector is a good example of a clearly wrong decision of one country and its legal system and how that should be responded to by other countries. I tend to take a more robust approach on this than many. There are also questions about the BBC report as to whether...

The Advertising Standards Authority have today published their adjudication about the RSPCA's "home for life" adverts. The ASA take the view that people do not need to be told that a proportion of the animals taken by the RSPCA under "home for life" are euthanased by the RSPCA even if they are rehomeable. The background to this is that a constituent of mine had some dogs taken by the RSPCA - because they thought she had too many dogs.  She later found that the RSPCA had put them down.   Her concern was that had she known this she could have rehomed the dogs herself and it was not clear on the form that she completed that they were likely to put the dogs down without referring to her. The "home for life" scheme advert can be seen here . We have obtained the paperwork from the RSPCA about "home for life" and it also does not make it clear that the RSPCA do euthanise some of the dogs that they take in even if they are rehomeable. My c...

John Hemming has discussed music performers and digital copyright in the past, and today Sarah Thompson advances the conversation by considering the seminal court cases in the debate over copyright issues in the digital age. You can read more from Sarah at the online resource where she frequently writes, which covers industry topics like how music production careers have evolved in the last two decades . The Problems Protecting Music Production and Copyright in the Digital Age Recent changes in technology have made it easier than ever to share and copy content, particularly music. The United State Copyright Act governs all of these transactions, but not comprehensively. Most provisions of the act were framed in a time when digital innovations could never have been imagined. Lawyers and lawmakers have struggled to stretch existing provisions to fit new and growing capabilities, with mixed results. Today’s music copyright landscape is mired in pitfalls, and defined by an ever-...

I noticed in The Telegraph a report of James Callaghan's speech in 1976 when he basically said that Labour's current plan of an increase in the deficit to increase demand would not work. I have found the original speech here . We used to think that you could spend your way out of a recession, and increase employ­ment by cutting taxes and boosting Government spending. I tell you in all candour that that option no longer exists, and that in so far as it ever did exist, it only worked on each occasion since the war by injecting a bigger dose of infla­tion into the economy, followed by a higher level of unemployment as the next step. Higher inflation followed by higher unemployment. We have just escaped from the highest rate of inflation this country has known; we have not yet escaped from the consequences: high unemployment. That is the history of the last 20 years. Each time we did this the twin evils of unemployment and inflation have hit hardest those least able to stand the...

The saga about Julian Assange may be entertaining for the media and it is clear that the UK should not take the step of raiding a foreign embassy (even in the roundabout way of declaring it not to be an embassy first). However, the treatment of the Rohingya in Myanmar (Burma) should have a much higher media profile. I raised the latter issue with the Foreign Secretary some weeks ago, but I suppose in terms of the relative media profiles twas ever thus.

Shale Gas will not have a direct effect on Peak Oil because Peak Oil relates to Oil. It will, however, have an effect on peak hydrocarbons (and there is also some condensate). The difficulty is assessing what effect it has. Key issues are for example that depletion rates for shale gas (possibly 48% in Haynesville) are higher than historic conventional natural gas. (20%) This presentation looks at some of the issues:

Today the Birmingham Safeguarding Board released a serious case review into the death of Aahliya Jordon-Fellows. Quoting from the website: " The review found that the death could and should have been prevented by a more robust application of safeguarding procedures by all agencies involved." My view for some time has been that the wrong children were taken into care. The case of Khyra Ishaq was an obvious one in which no-one was seeing the child. On the other hand stroppy home educating parents - whose children are seen by others and hence are known to be OK - tend to find themselves the target of child protection proceedings. The case of Aahliya Jordon-Fellows is in one sense a straighforward one where someone known to be a risk to children (her Uncle) was given her care and found guilty of her manslaughter. What I am trying to do with the Family Justice Bill amongst other things is get greater academic consideration of child protection proceedings so that the reall...

This story is where social workers from Norfolk ignored the law and went to France to get a baby. The phrase "habitual residence" determines which country is responsible for child protection. I am not aware of any country that makes as many absurd decisions as England. Most other countries make decisions that are about what is best for the child rather than what is best for the local authority targets. If the parents are "habitually resident" in another country when the baby is born then the authorities here do not have any legal power to take the child. That did not stop them in the linked case, but at least the High Court got the law right even if the lower court did not. Congratulations are due to Brendan Fleming Solicitors for fighting the case properly.

This judgment looks at the use of a voluntary agreement to put a child into care. At the time of "agreeing" to this the mother had been medicated with Morphine. She was also told it was temporary when it has given rise to a forced adoption. In the end, however, it has still given rise to a forced adoption. Parents are often bullied into accepting S20 agreements with the threat of court proceedings. This judgment doesn't really help.

This is where the president of the family division puts his view on the secret court system. As usual he is focussed on the question of media access. This ignores the fact that there are a number of constraints on accountability that include the constraints on the media being involved. There is the question of professional standards. As it currently stands the Health Professions Council remain of the view that they should not investigate psychologists who are reported by parties to family court cases without the permission of the judge. That is an unacceptable constraint. Secondly, there is no academic access to the material as of right. That means that each case operates in its own isolated sphere of reality. Specialists cannot audit the evidence given. Thirdly, when cases some to the court of appeal there is no publication of the original judgment. Fourthly, the cases are oppressive for individuals who cannot bring in others beyond a mackenzie friend (and often an MF is re...

My Family Justice Private Members bill has now been published for public consultation on my website here The version that goes to the second reading is likely to be different. It has also been sent formally to the government for consultation. Details of who to respond to and the deadline (which is 20th September) are in the bill. It has interleaved explanatory notes.

The following are videos from the performance of John Hemming and the Sisters of Jazz at the Hotel du Vin on 8th July 2012 as part of the Birmingham Jazz Festival Sweet Georgia Brown Take the ‘A’ train Moon River Stepping Out Cheek to Cheek Beyond the Sea Fever Foggy Day Summertime Strike up the Band My funny valentine ‘s Wonderful Royal Flush How High the Moon Somewhere over the Rainbow All of Me Perdido Satin Doll Prelude to a Kiss

Thanks to "liarpolicians" for the youtube recording.

Channel 4 have presented a piece about the refugees who leave this country because they cannot get a fair trial in England (and Wales). This is actually mainly an English and Welsh problem.  There is a problem in Scotland and Northern Ireland, but proportionally it is much worse in England and Wales. That is because the jurisdiction that has problems is the English and Welsh jurisdiction. The stupidity of the government and lack of willingness to look at individual injustices adds to the errors of procedure in the courts. I have been advising people who have left the country since late 2007.

This article in The Independent looks at some of the problems with the Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards. The systemic problems with this process are exacerbated by the Cheshire West decision in the court of appeal. Sam Smith , Lucy Series and Anna Raccoon (not her real name) have written some useful pieces about this. We are closer still to publishing the draft Family Justice Bill.

A lot of effort is going into the details of my private members bill. A draft bill should be published early next week. In the mean time, however, John Hemming and the Sisters of Jazz performed as part of the Birmingham Jazz Festival last sunday afternoon (at Hotel du Vin). Photos copyright Jim Simpson. More information on the festival is here Now I am back from parliament for the weekend I intend to see some of the gigs. There will be videos of our gig at some stage in the future.

I find it a bit odd that four people saw fit to highlight a tweet that I ate a ham and coleslaw baguette from Greggs in Birmingham. Whereas Only two people retweeted the fact that a journalist had been banned from the UK to prevent her from writing about things. C'est la vie.

This link is to her weblog. The Guardian has also published an article written by Helen Pidd about the issue. In essence an American journalist has been banned from the Common Travel Area (which includes the UK and Jersey). It appears that the reason is to prevent her investigating Haut de la Garenne and the associated issues. If this was happening in another country there would be outrage, but the fact that it is happening here doesn't seem to cause any concerns. Odd really.

This judgment (today) shows how depressing the system is in terms of how it looks after children. Children have been made statutory orphans and then just left in that state. In fact the government could if it could be bothered track how many children are in that state through the SSDA903 return, but hasn't been bothered to do so. It is a mistake to think there is anything substantially different in a placement order from a freeing order. Both separate children from their family networks (and often their siblings) without actually ensuring there is an alternative. Anyone who looks objectively at the system has to conclude that it is depressingly bad.