Welcome to the online consultation forum for the Law Commission's Tenth Programme of Law Reform.

Archive

Below are the posts made before 1st March, 2007. These have been summarised in the discussion areas, but you can read them in full if you’d prefer.

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Welcome to the Web Forum

Posted by Nicholas Piska on 05/02/2007 - 12:43

Welcome to the Web Forum and thank you for taking time to participate in this consultation exercise.

In this discussion you can make your suggestions as to which areas of law are in need of reform. You may also comment on suggestions already posted to the forum.

If a topic requires further discussion or gains particular interest we will open a new discussion.

Nicholas Piska
Tenth Programme Team

Threading

Posted by Nicholas Piska on 16/02/2007 - 10:46

We have made an alteration to the forum to allow 'threading' of comments. This means that if you reply to a comment your post will be indented and appear directly beneath the comment to which you are replying. This should make it easier to follow discussions relating to certain topics.

Unfortunately, comments made prior to 16 February cannot be threaded and will remain in chronological order.

Please let us know if you find 'threading' more convenient or if it causes you any problems by emailing edemocracy@hansard.lse.ac.uk

Nicholas Piska
Tenth Programme Team

Accepted meaning of Insolvency rule 4.228 turned on its head

Posted by Dunem Good on 20/02/2007 - 13:43

I propose a change to the wording of Rule 4.228 of the Insolvency Rules 1986.
A recent judgement (Churchill & Churchill Vs First Independent Factors) interpreted “with a view to being” as having effect to what is now. Whatever the precise English interpretation and I believe that as English is a live language the commonly and widely accepted interpretation should prevail, it is clear that for 20 years Insolvency Practitioners and their legal counsel have taken the view that while “with a view to being” clearly described future intention it had no bearing on the status at the time of sending of the notice referred to in the rule.

Family Law

Posted by happydadtoo on 06/02/2007 - 06:28

The present system of applying the Children's Act 1989 is NOT what parliament wanted and is manifestly not in the interests of the children involved.

These changes are required:

All Orders are published (names witheld) so individual judges can be held to account for anomalous decisions.

All orders should be appeallable - I was told by two Lord Justices of Appeal that it was not possible to appeal an Order.

No 'leave to Remove' should be heard except in front of THREE County Coutrlevel judges with at least 5 years experience in Family Law matters.
Children (all ages) should be interviewed directly by the judge himself and their views regarded as all but decisive.

Easter Act 1928 etc.

Posted by Jeffrey Shaw on 06/02/2007 - 10:00

1. Repeal this and ALL other as-yet unimplemented Acts- or bring them into force asap. Why enact legislation which is doomed never to take effect?

2. Consolidate ALL pre-1901 Acts as first step towards condensing legislation into more modern (language/layout) and shorter corpus.

Easter Act 1928

Posted by Andrew Bullock on 21/02/2007 - 13:06

I agree with the spirit of this posting and would like to add a further modest proposals of my own; viz the introduction of a statutory mechanism, retrospective in effect, whereby all statutory provisions would automatically be repealed unless brought into force within a specified period from the date upon which the act in which they were contained first received the Royal Assent. Such a provision would both promote certainty in, and reduce the volume of, statute law and would not (insofar as I can see) offend against any existing constitutional convention.

Family Law - Shared Care

Posted by 24601 on 06/02/2007 - 15:57

At present, entitlement to a myriad of tax credits and benefits, not least the "right" to claim through the Child Support Agency is based on recipiency of Child Benefit. The completion of the Child Benefit application form is nothing more than an accident of history - few think about the implications of parents separating at the time of a child's birth. However, in cases of shared care arrangements, be it through the Court or otherwise, the system is fundamentally flawed.
Of course, I speak from experience: I have a 50/50 shared care arrangement with my ex-partner - the care and residency of her is more than shared, it is joint. Because my ex completed the Child Benefit (hereafter "CB") forms shortly after our daughter's birth, she has the legal right to claim through the CSA. The forms for CB are in the Bounty pack delivered to 3.2 million new mothers at the hospital bedside each year. Over the last 3 years, and approx 3000 samples and flyers contained in the pack - 99.8% have been aimed at the mother; 0.2% at the father (last one was back in Sep '06 - 2 cans of Red Bull). The form is in a pack whose contents are specifically aimed (99.8% of the time) at mothers. In most families it will be she who goes through the contents and completes the forms. Once again, the impact of this in the future is realised by very few.

Traffic Offences

Posted by LincolnMan on 06/02/2007 - 19:48

In particular I refer to the Road Traffic Act, and the law round speeding offences.

There are many points about his are of law that makes this 'bad' law. There are three points in particular that ought to be rectified, in order to make the law just.

1. The requirement of S172 that forces the completion of the Notice of Intended prosecution.This is currently under consideration in the ECHR, but no matter what happens, it is clearly unfair that a driver is effectively forced to confess to a speeding offence, with out a proper caution under PACE, or prosecuted for failing to confess. There needs to be a different method of prosecuting speeding offenders that doesn't use this brutal approach.

The Clean Neighbourhood and Environment Act June 2005

Posted by Hogspark on 08/02/2007 - 10:56

Under the terms of this Act litter droppers can be fined up to £50K and be subject to up to 5 years in jail. BUT (having had tinkers in a field close to me who deposited bulk filth over a short period-gas canisters, plastic toys, disposable nappies etc.) I find the Act can only be enforced by a Council employee who SEES the litter being dropped. This is absolutely useless: the Act, on the face of it, is ideal for disciplining the likes of tinkers and fly tippers, but needs urgent amendment so the law can be applied to those who cause the worst offences and get away without any sanctions. Very many towns around the country are held to ransom by tinkers and the litter problem is something that should be tackled.

Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 and Police Act 1999

Posted by Macdan on 08/02/2007 - 16:18

Summary of reasons for reform

• Ex offenders are not getting a fair opportunity to enter employment or training; the circle of crime and unemployment is being perpetuated; yet employment has a major effect in reducing repeat offending;

• The policy focus is concentrating on high profile sex and violent offenders and ignores the needs of the vast majority of other ex-offenders;

• The scheme of rehabilitation periods and spent and unspent offences is complex, has not kept up with sentencing policy and is widely misunderstood;

• Employers are not helped in conducting effective risk assessments and tend to reject ex -offenders without effectively assessing their suitability;

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