[Closed] Cleggs 'Freedom Bill'....

I prefer to call it the 'Freedom Repeal Bill'

there's still an old law in the statute book that says it's an offence if you don't report a grey squirrel in your own back garden

If this is the sort of restriction on my liberty that he is targetting then I am not going to waste my time. He can go away and look through the statute books for stuff about shooting welshmen with crossbows himself. There are plenty of other things that appear rather more pressing.

[i]Cleggs 'Freedom Bill'[/i]

I guess this won't include removing my freedom to vote for a minority party that chooses to ignore its own manifesto at the first sniff of access to power?

I guess this won't include removing my freedom to vote for a minority party that chooses to ignore its own manifesto at the first sniff of access to power?

they are still a minority party with only a few bargaining chips on the table hence their ability to get the tories (who were dead-against change to voting reform) to consider changing the voting system to something a little more progressive.

Thinking 'Freedom', and repealing laws, it seems a perfect opportunity to lobby for similar access rights as are found in Scotland.

repealing of the prohibitive laws i guess first

I wonder if Clegg has read Dom Raab's The Assault on Liberty. Since 1997 there have been 45 new criminal justice laws passed - more than the total during the preceding century (!) - creating 3,000 new criminal offences. Perhaps Clegg could simply work backwards, undoing the more pernicious recent laws first and leaving the squirrel reporting until last.

I bet nothing of significance is repealed. Zero zilch nada

Its a classic piece of pandering to the daily wail

Scottish access laws would never work in England, and never get put on the books. Too many people, not enough space, people are too used to privacy and not used to the responsibility that would have to come with it.

There'd be people running all over just to annoy landowners; big powerful landowners would be afraid of that happening.. there'd be hell to pay for sure.

Which one's Clegg?
I always get them mixed up

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I believe the Digital Economy Bill is being targeted, and ID Card stuff.

Repealing the CJA would be a good start tho 🙂

Can the enclosures acts be repealed?

Could he repeal Ant and Dec? Seriously? And Michael Winner.

molgrips - Member

Scottish access laws would never work in England, and never get put on the books. Too many people, not enough space, people are too used to privacy and not used to the responsibility that would have to come with it.

There'd be people running all over just to annoy landowners; big powerful landowners would be afraid of that happening.. there'd be hell to pay for sure.

I tend to agree. The arrangements here were worked out in consensus and agreement between all parties - including the landowners. I simply can't see the landowners agreeing in England.

There is also a different culture about access to the land

Hunting with dogs.

Agree that Scottish style access is unlikely, but the footpth / bridleway etc issues could be addressed.

Classic out-dated stuff dating back to when horse / foot were the only means of transport

sounds like a load of hot air to me
to show how modern and progressive the government is
to make us feel all empowered as wages fall prices rise and we tumble into a recession

how about a referendum on pulling out of afgahnistan?
or how about an end to drug prohibition and prostitution, legalise and tax the lot i say

I tried to repeal an orange once
It's was a sticky and ultimately futile experience.

What a load of bollocks. Tokenistic nonsense - Nick Clegg has sold out the Lib Dems and they will be destroyed at the next election.

repealing of the prohibitive laws i guess first

As a side note - wittering on about the number of laws passed as if it made any difference per se is utterly pointless. What matters is the practical effect of the laws, not the number of legislative instruments.

The day after Clarke more or less admitted that Tory policy on Prisons was a pile of donkey doodoo, and knowing the Mail would rip them to shreds about it, they send Nick "Every-ones best mate" Clegg out with this one...

It's straight out of Malcolm Tucker's play-book

What a load of crap!

Saw Clegg on Breakfast TV talking about this. He came across like the work experience kid who has been give a little "project" to keep him out of mischief while the grown-ups get on with the serious stuff.

I'd be absolutely amazed if this leads to anything other than a repeal of the hunting ban or something else on the Tory backbench wishlist, with the Lib Dems and Nick Clegg acting as a human shield for it. The Lib Dems are going to get destroyed at the next election.

if you click on the link at the bottom of that BBC page [url= http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/10473752.stm ]unwanted rules[/url] You get straight away a list of myths created by the papers!

Utter bobbins!

it's a load of rubbish. the quote i heard on the radio this morning was cleg saying that there's still a law on the statute books about being compelled to kill grey squirrels on your land, he went on to add that this was the kind of thing he wanted to get rid of. what a waste of public money.

First of all I would like to see all human rights and benefits taken away from all prisoners. Why should we reward the criminals?

J.Miller, Washington, Tyne & Wear

"

Love it.

 

All foreigners coming into the country should not be given benefits or be able to use the NHS or even get council houses. They should have paid taxes first for one year before being able to do any of these.

Val, Merseyside

Is already the case for example.

[

Since 1997 there have been 45 new criminal justice laws passed - more than the total during the preceding century (!) - creating 3,000 new criminal offences.

Bl@@dy H£ll

never thought there were so many - must all be good laws tho as real crime has dropped, less shotings, knifeings, rapes, murders

if you beleive the stats

I'd like to repeal whatever the last parliamentry reform act was (1832? or 1867?) and replace it with a house of commons elected by PR. Its not like first past the post got us a united and consistent government this time did it!

*runs for cover*

But surely getting rid of ridicolous old acts would save some of the tax payer money? no?

As i'm sure there are quite a few people that stick by them and get people into trouble for doing it. Costing money the court system in the end.

Maybe should be constructive and think of the bills that you think should be changed/removed rather than slating clegg/lib dems/ tories.

Been there, done that, got the t-shirt...its getting old, whats done is done get on with it!!!

But surely getting rid of ridicolous old acts would save some of the tax payer money? no?

As i'm sure there are quite a few people that stick by them and get people into trouble for doing it. Costing money the court system in the end.

While I accept that the reporting might be out of context, this is just Ross McToss:

Speaking on BBC Breakfast, Mr Clegg said there was "lots and lots of old stuff on the statute books that we should get rid of for starters".

"I've just discovered for instance, would you believe it, that there's still an old law in the statute book that says it's an offence if you don't report a grey squirrel in your own back garden," he said.

And all this "cutting red tape" flannel is just rubbish - all of the laws identified (speeding, OH&S, tax) have policy objectives behind them, and whether or not you agree with the objectives, it's not like they are purposeless anachronisms - it's not like there are laws that say you can only fill in customs clearance application forms in Latin, in green ink, on Tuesdays or whatever. Can anyone actually come up with a law that serves no purpose (as opposed to no good purpose)?

If we really wanted to save the courts time, reduce crime, allocate police resources better, raise taxes and cut state expenditure, it's not squirrel-reporting laws that need repealing - it's the prohibition of (and consequently the untaxed sale of) cannabis and the restrictions on medical prescription of heroin.

But of course those are the sorts of policies you have to abandon after years in opposition when you shack up with the Blue Meanies, and you're left with the abolition of policies that appear more often in the Did You Know? column of the paper than in the law reports...

TandemJeremy - Member

I tend to agree. The arrangements here were worked out in consensus and agreement between all parties - including the landowners.

Remind me to give you a potted history of the LR(S)A 2003 sometime. I might even have an original (pre F&M) draft somewhere. Let me just assure you that the landowners had very little say in the final version - on account of their irresponsible behaviour during the F&M outbreak.

on account of their irresponsible behaviour during the F&M outbreak.

1st law of thermodynamics please, makes physics lessons dull.

Its the endless amounts of regulations that I would like to see repealed. Often enforced by pseudo-law enforcement agency's, who are little more than quango's.

It has created a huge public misunderstanding of what is 'Law' and, for the most part they are 'toothless'.

Such as Jackson? Lets have some examples

Just had a gander at this Freedom 2.0 website. People seem to be missing the point somewhat:

"Which current laws would you like to remove or change because they restrict your civil liberties?"

'Death penalty for tax evasion'
'Compulsory overseas service for denial of climate change'
'Enforce 30 mph with average speed cameras'
'Bring Back the public stocks'

Such as Jackson? Lets have some examples

Well just of the top of my head, look at the FSA with their clipboards and rule books. Absolutely and utterly powerless against the might of the banks.

In my opinion rafts of regulations have 'muddied the water' of what is law and what isn't. Only this morning BBC breakfast informed me that unions say that "hundreds of schools are breaking the law by using untrained staff to fill in for absent teachers"... oh really I thought then why are these schools not being dealt with under the law. Reality is they are operating against regulation/best practice but not illegally.

So -- yuou want o abolish the fsa? They might not be the best but its better than nowt.

I am not sure what you meant about the schools - do you want schools to use unqualified teacher?

It may well be actually illegal anyway - I am fairly sure its a statutory requirement for teachers to be qualified. Not a code of conduct but a legal requirement to have properly qualified staff

the raft of regulations yo want to get rid of? What are they?

Reality is they are operating against regulation/best practice but not illegally.

Can I legally bugger my wife now? Suppose I should wake her up and ask her - might have to make her breakfast first!

richcc - Member
Can I legally bugger my wife now? Suppose I should wake her up and ask her - might have to make her breakfast first!

lolwut? Regulation is secondary legislation - it is law.

So why is nothing done about it under the law?... like I say 'toothless'.

BTW Regulation is NOT law, you're correct that it backs up law. Penalties usually being fines for contravention with the threat of prosecution for non compliance. The cynical amongst us (i.e. me) 😉 would argue that control of everything through regulation creates manifold revenue streams. Fantastic for the 'state', not so good for the freedom of the individual.

My argument is to clear out all the self serving 'toothless' pseudo law enforcement agencies, which are largely useless, and bring everyone under the rule of law (which incidentally has always been there). It has become ingrained in our culture to 'ban' everything that may be seen as a threat rather than deal with the issue with the instruments that we already have.

We are still awaiting examples of these mythical bodies

Ofsted
FSA
HSE
Defra...

Ofstead. So who is going to regulate schools then? Or are you going to allow anything to happen? Who sets the curriculum and does inspections?

HSE - don't be bloody ridiculous. HSE do a fantastic job. Investigations into accidents to reduce further accidents amongst otyher things

Completely ridiculous.

All of those organisations have serious and useful functrions that would have to be done by somone or standards would drop

somone or standards would drop

'cause standards have significantly risen have they? We increasingly pander to the lowest common denominator which has a counter effect, a sort of backward benchmarking of behavior if you will.

Working at Height Regs. Absolute joke!

All of those organisations have serious and useful functrions

Yeah keeping adenoidal jobsworth 'officials' in expensive (to the taxpayer) non jobs. Widespread regulation acts as a barrier to business making UK plc uncompetitive in a global marketplace. I agree that we need some regulation and control but we already have that enshrined in law.

Anyway, just my opinion, no need to get het up comrade!

HSE - don't be bloody ridiculous. HSE do a fantastic job. Investigations into accidents to reduce further accidents amongst otyher things

and many of the things attributed to being because of HSE are myths - coming from others who have misread situations - and try to back up their position by blaming it on the HSE

Jackson - its that you are talking so much piffle.

Without offstead who will inspect schools? Or will you let them go uninspected so we don't even know which ones are doing badly?

Ridiculous.

Safety regulations make us uncompetitive? Well compared to china where they dojn't mind killed the workforce perhpas.

Again - without HSE how is going to investigate workplace accident\
?

I'm not talking about completely removing them, rather scaling them back and staffing them with personnel that have real authority under the law (that is already there). They should have a real appreciation of law, ideally, solicitors specializing in a particular area.

HMRC is an example of an agency that has real power. They are not drowned in a sea of regulation. They are staffed by forensic accountants and specialist lawyers, and they work to the law that has been statute for a very long time... "don't pay your taxes and you shall be liable"

TJ - I agree that HSE do a superb job, and that most of the ridiculous health and safety stuff reported in the newspapers is either untrue or mis-reported. However that doesn't mean there aren't some significant regulations that are poorly thought out and over-rigorously applied - the working at height regulations JP mentions is a good one.

Back to more general stuff, I'd like to repeal the law which says we have to implement every regulation from Brussels strictly without the use of any discretion and common sense. I presume we must have a specific UK law about this, given they seem to be rather more lax in other countries.

So why is nothing done about it under the law?... like I say 'toothless'.

BTW Regulation is NOT law, you're correct that it backs up law.

- Regulations are law: if you break them, you can be punished by the state. If they weren't law, they couldn't serve as the basis for state action - they'd be no more effective than you or I writing a list of dos and don'ts.

- It is not true that regulations only result in fines.

- "The law" isn't just primary legislation passed by Westminster. There's secondary legislation, common law (judge-made law), customary international law...

- The purpose of secondary legislation is for the Parliament to authorise someone to make rules on its behalf so it doesn't have to waste its time getting buried in minutiae. As a hypothetical example, Parliament decides that it is necessary to control Car Safety. It has two choices: either it can pass primary legislation that regulates every single aspect and standard that it wants to see, and every time a change has to be made, a whole new act has to be put through Parliament, sucking up a significant proportion of the legislature's time. If a new type of windscreen glass gets developed and it needs to be approved for installation in new cars, Westminster would have to pass a Windscreen Approval Act. Or Parliament can dodge all that fannying around and can say "We authorise the Car Safety Authority to make regulations for the purpose of ensuring the safe design and manufacture of cars". The fact that a legal obligation unilaterally imposed by the state is achieved secondary legislation (regulations made by the Car Safety Authority) instead of primary legislation (regulations made made by Parliament) doesn't make it any less "the law".

HMRC is ... not drowned in a sea of regulation...they work to the law that has been statute for a very long time

do you want schools to use unqualified teacher?

Konabunny - can I ask what legal training you have? Or do you just believe the rhetoric that most closely matches your own view. It is you who appears ignorant.

Regs. merely back up the law. They are not law in themselves, hence are 'toothless' instruments in dealing punitively with a particular issue. You try and prosecute somebody for the breaking of regulation.

If he wanted his kids to be taught by unqualified teachers, he'd pay extra and send them private, surely...

So its not 'against the law' for unqualified staff to teach? Funny that.