24th January 2012: The Day of the Endangered Lawyers

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Dear Colleagues,

 

I am sending you the Petition and the Press Release for the Day of the Endangered Lawyers 24th January 2012.

 

In order to protest against the unlawful and intolerable obstruction of lawyers in Turkey and against the severe human rights violations connected to this, on the 24th of January lawyers in many cities in Europe will organize demonstrations wearing their gown in front of Turkish Embassies and Consulates. A petition addressed to the Turkish Government will be handed over. in Amsterdam, Barcelona, Berlin, Bern, Brussels, Dusseldorf, The Hague, Hamburg, Madrid, Milan, Paris, Rome and other cities forum discussions or other activities will be organized.


All lawyers are requested to support and to participate in these activities. The protests will be organized by the local organisations of AED-EDL, ELDH and IDHAE.
Those who have not yet organized anything still have the time to organize at least a small protest in front of the Turkish Embassy or Consulate in their Country..


Best wishes,

 

Thomas Schmidt

ELDH European Association of Lawyers for Democracy and World Human Rights

(lawyer), Secretary General

 

Full press release and petition can be downloaded here

The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers fully supports the industrial action called by unions on 30th November 2011.

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We do not know whether PCS court workers will be able to close courts. If so, we encourage our members not to cross picket-lines. Below is a statement agreed with PCS for the industrial action in June.

For details of protests around the country, see here.

The Haldane Society will be joining marchers at noon, assemble at Lincoln's Inn Fields, WC2A 3PE. March to the Victoria Embankment, WC2N 6NU, for a rally at 2pm.

Some courts will be closed and there will certainly be picket-lines at any that remain open. We encourage our members to show solidarity with the striking court workers by respecting the picket-lines so long as that does not breach members' professional duties. This situation has been explained to PCS who understand the constraints on practising lawyers under a professional duty to attend court but who would not wish to cross a picket line. Members can express their solidarity with the PCS in other ways, in particular by making a donation to the Ministry of Justice Group hardship fund (see the statement below for details).

Members are urged to make arrangements before 30th November to avoid, if possible, the need for their attendance at court on that day so long as the interests of their clients are protected. If you have no alternative but to attend court on 30th November take this statement with you and show it to the PCS steward. We would encourage members who find that they do have to appear in court on 30th November to consider donating some of their personal remuneration to the strike hardship fund.

Please see a statement from the PCS for further details of support to be offered.

We apologise to members for the late sending of this email.

PCS hardship fund:

PCS welcomes payments to our Ministry of Justice Group hardship fund; cheques should be made payable to PCS MoJ Group Hardship Fund Account and sent to c/o Robin Fallon 30 Saltwell Street, Gateshead Tyne and Wear NE8 4QX. This fund is used to help cover the cost of going on strike for union members who face particular financial hardship. Our lowest paid members earn between £13,894 and £15,524 full time pay outside London and in London they earn just £16,737 to £18,700. These wage rates are for those working as court ushers and some administration staff. This gives you an idea of how low paid some of our members are and the sacrifice they make going on strike. To add to this our members are affected by a two year pay freeze and are now threatened with working longer and paying increased pension contributions for a lower pension when they finally retire.

Tuesday 18th October: Haldane Parliamentary briefing on Enforcing Housing Rights in East Jerusalem

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The briefing session will be conducted by members of a delegation of English barristers organised by Avocats Sans Frontiers who visited Jerusalem between 19 and 23 December 2010. International lawyers Professor Bill Bowring and Hannah Rought-Brooks joined housing rights specialists John Beckley, Liz Davies, John Hobson, and Marina Sergides in conducting the investigation. The objective of the fact finding mission was to examine the legal situation in Sheikh Jarrah, a Palestinian area located to the north of the Old City in East Jerusalem. Sheikh Jarrah, is the site of a protracted legal battle where the evictions of more than 25 families from their homes have repercussions for the viability of a future Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement and the long term status of Jerusalem. According to the United Nations, over 60 Palestinians have been forcibly evicted in Sheikh Jarrah in recent years leaving another 500 at risk of dispossession and displacement. The briefing session will discuss the findings of the delegation and how the situation in Sheikh Jarrah can be addressed within the framework of international humanitarian law and human rights law.

See a summary of the report "Enforcing Housing Rights: the Case of Sheikh Jarrah" here or download the full report from here.

Free admission. Please note that it can take up to 30 minutes to proceed through security at Westminster. Please rsvp or request to Sara Apps at: sara.apps@palestinecampaign.org

Nearest tube stations: Westminster, St James Park, Victoria. Further information www.palestinecampaign.org.

6pm, House of Lords, Westminster London SW1.

Download poster for the event here

Haldane Society responded to the Ministry of Justice's consultation on "Options for dealing with Squatting".

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Our response is here:

The Society is opposed to proposalstto create a new criminal offence of trespass (or squatting) for the following reasons;

The paper presents no evidence, other than stories in the press, that squatting of individual's homes is a significant problem. Such evidence as has been gathered- for example the recently published report by Crisis- "Squatting a homelessness issue" ( download pdf here ) - suggests ,squatting takes place in unoccupied properties and is the last resort of the desperate

The unauthorized occupation of residential premises is already a criminal offence under Section 7 of the 1977 Criminal Law Act., and it is a myth to say that the current law, when properly applied, is not adequate to deal with the problems. This is a question of education and administration not legislation. The creation of a new offence is unnecessary

It is proposed to extend the new offence to the occupation of all types of buildings, including the commercial and the public. Adequate remedies are available in the civil court to the owners of such properties and they have the knowledge and resources to use them. In the current economic climate, there is no justification for such an extension of the law to protect those who are not faced with the loss of their home and who already have adequate means of resolving their own problems.

There is no discussion of enforcement. The police are currently unwilling to involve themselves in disputes relating to property. It is unlikely that the proposed new offence will change this. Resource strapped local authorities (many of whom no longer have tenancy relations service) will not be willing to enforce the law either.

The new offence would be open to abuse by unscrupulous landlords.

The minister is dismissive of the idea that squatting is a reasonable recourse of the homeless suffering from social deprivation because

"There are avenues open to those who are genuinely destitute and who need shelter which do not involve occupying somebody else's property without authority. No matter how compelling or difficult the squatter's own circumstances, it is wrong that legitimate occupants should be deprived of the use of their property".

The Society disagrees. The avenues open to the genuinely destitute have become increasingly narrowed in recent years. The number of affordable tenancies (either public or private) has shrunk massively. The changes in Housing Benefit will exacerbate this. Many of the homeless do not receive the assistance from local authorities that they are entitled to. There is every indication that this will get worse, as the Crisis report suggests.

The minister refers to proposal "stop squatters getting legal aid to fight eviction." People who are accused of squatting only get Legal Aid if they can demonstrate that they have a reasonable chance of proving they have a right to remain - in which case they are not squatters.

The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers and Avocats Sans Frontiers present

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"Enforcing Housing Rights: the case of Sheikh Jarrah": a report of the fact-finding mission to Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

Tensions have flared in Sheikh Jarrah, a Palestinian area located to the north of the Old City in occupied East Jerusalem. Over the last three years, more than 60 Palestinians have been forcibly evicted in this area and at least another 500 are at risk of dispossession and displacement, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA).

Since the start of the Israeli occupation and annexation of East Jerusalem in 1967, which continues until today, the Palestinian refugee families in Sheikh Jarrah have been the target of eviction proceedings brought by the Committees and their successor, the Nahalat Shimon Company (to whom all rights and obligations were transferred in 2008-2009), before Israeli courts, resulting in the eviction of 4 refugee families to date (60 people) – the Mohammad Al-Kurd, Al-Ghawi, Hanoun and Rifqa Al-Kurd families – all of whom had already been forcibly displaced at least once before.

Following a request from local lawyers and NGOs received by Avocats Sans Frontières, an international legal expert mission visited Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT) from 19 to 23 December 2010. The delegation - organised by the Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers - consisted of four English barristers, all specializing in housing rights – John Beckley, Liz Davies, and Marina Sergides and John Hobson as well as English barrister and human rights lawyer Hannah Rought-Brooks and Bill Bowring, also a barrister practising at the European Court of Human Rights, and Professor of Law at Birkbeck College, University of London. The delegation was accompanied by ASF project coordinator Stijn Denayer and human rights lawyer Valentina Azarov.

Their report "Enforcing Housing Rights: the case of Sheikh Jarrah" examines the Palestinian housing rights crisis in East Jerusalem, Israel's breaches of international law as an occupying power, the inequalities faced by Palestinians before the Israeli Courts, law enforcement failures and breaches of international law in carrying out evictions. It contains recommendations to Israel, the UN and international community, the European Union and the UK government.

Recommendations to the UK government are:

- To declare publicly that it will use its influence and all available mechanisms within the EU to ensure that the EU acts upon the recommendations set out immediately above.

- To ensure that senior UK officials observe court hearings concerning Sheikh Jarrah, and visit Sheikh Jarrah; and join high-level groups from the EU.

- To continue and if possible intensify the present policy of providing all possible support to the Sheikh Jarrah families.

- To give urgent and public consideration to the question how it can best comply with the obligations laid upon it (and all other states) by the International Court of Justice in 2004:

- All States are under an obligation not to recognize the illegal situation resulting from the construction of the wall and not to render aid or assistance in maintaining the situation created by such construction;

- All States parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War of 12 August 1949 have in addition the obligation, while respecting the United Nations Charter and international law, to ensure compliance by Israel with international humanitarian law as embodied in that Convention.

- In particular, to take steps to implement the recommendation by Amnesty International in 2009 that the UK government should “suspend all military exports to Israel until there is no longer a substantial risk that such equipment will be used for serious violations of human rights.

The views contained in the report and the recommendations are those of the delegation.

Download full report here ( 6.7MB )

Haldane Opposes Riot-Related Evictions

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The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers opposes any attempt to evict tenants for the actions of members of their family, especially when those actions do not impact on their neighbours' lives.

We protest at threats by Wandsworth Council to start eviction proceedings against a council tenant on the apparent basis that a member of her family might have been involved in some of the rioting committed in the second week of August 2011. We believe that subjecting a family to eviction constitutes collective punishment of the whole family for the alleged actions of one individual. If the individual has committed a crime, he or she should be subject to the usual penalties through the criminal justice system. His or her family should not be made homeless.
We will be responding to the government's consultation on extending social landlords' powers to seek possession for criminality and anti-social behaviour and expressing our opposition to those proposals. We call upon social landlords not to penalise their tenants for the actions of those who live with them.

Promises and Challenges: The Tunisian Revolution of 2010-2011

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The Report of the March 2011 Delegation of Attorneys to Tunisia.

In March 2011 three members of the Haldane's executive committee joined colleagues from America and Turkey in an international human rights delegation to Tunisia. Co-chairs Katherine Craig and Anna Morris travelled to Tunis with Russell Fraser where they spent five days meeting with politicians, trade unionists, bloggers and democracy campaigners. The delegation heard evidence of state torture and corruption. During the Ben Ali years a culture of impunity reigned, a feature common to dictatorships across the world. Another feature common to such regimes is the interference of Western governments in furtherance of imperial desires. Tunisia is no different and has experienced French and US meddling in its internal affairs in its recent history.

The group has produced a report on its activities, those they met, and recommendation for the future which can be downloaded here.

The Haldane Society of Socialist Lawyers fully supports the industrial action called by PCS and other unions on 30th June 2011.

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PCS Ministry of Justice workers, including Court workers will be taking strike action to resist cuts to their pensions, increases in their pension contributions and more years to work until they get them. This is all part of the cuts to legal services which will close courts permanently, create redundancies amongst court staff, close Law Centres and CABx, cut Legal Aid so denying access to justice for all but the rich and driving lawyers from publicly funded work.

On 30th June some Courts will be closed and there will certainly be picket-lines at any that remain open. We encourage our members to show solidarity with the striking Court workers by respecting the picket-lines so long as that does not breach members' professional duties. This situation has been explained to PCS who understand the constraints on practising lawyers under a professional duty to attend court but who would not wish to cross a picket line. Members can express their solidarity with the PCS in other ways, in particular by making a donation to the Ministry of Justice Group hardship fund (see the statement below for details).

Members are urged to make arrangements before 30th June to avoid, if possible, the need for their attendance at court on that day so long as the interests of their clients are protected. If you have no alternative but to attend court on 30th June take this statement with you and show it to the PCS steward. We would encourage members who find that they do have to appear in Court on 30th June to consider donating some of their personal remuneration to the strike hardship fund.

PCS will be holding over 50 rallies, marches and picnics all around the country on 30 June.

Here are the details:

http://www.pcs.org.uk In Central London, PCS will assemble at 11am, at Lincoln Inn Fields, WC2A 3TL.  Music provided by Love Music Hate Racism. March to Westminster Central Hall, Storeys Gate, London. SW1H 9NH, for a rally at 1pm. Speakers include union general secretaries - Christine Blower (NUT), Mary Bousted (ATL), Sally Hunt (UCU), and Mark Serwotka (PCS); Dot Gibson of the National Pensioners Convention; and Labour MP John McDonnell. Please try and attend one of the events in your area.

PCS has been an active player in the campaigns to save legal aid, giving evidence at Haldane Society's Commission of Inquiry into Legal Aid in February. Many Haldane members are either directly employed by public authorities or, as legal aid practitioners, are effectively public servants. The battle to save public sector pensions is part of the battle to retain the welfare state, under attack by the Coalition government. We stand shoulder to shoulder with our brothers and sisters in the PCS and other public sector unions.

Details of the event can be found here, and the poster can be downloaded here