I was alternately amused and vaguely saddened by an article in the Law Gazette on the public's continued perception of solicitors as only slightly higher up the ladder of moral evolution than estate agents. As a profession, Which? have found, solicitors are...
Assured tenant or trespasser? The waiting begins.
On the vexed question of whether a breach of an old style Suspended Possession Order ended an assured tenancy and left a tolerated trespasser, we now have two first level decisions: Stan v Stadium HA at Willesden CC and Knowsley HT v White at Liverpool CC....
Legal Aid. Not funny. At all.
Now we know that the Lord Chancellor's vow to the Law Society that changes in non-criminal legal aid were postponed for a year only apply, post 'clarification', to Family, it is time for a serious look at the new contract for civil legal aid. First of all,...
Better (too) late than never
After dipping its toe in the water of protest with a petition, as previously mentioned, the Law Society has finally decided that a campaign to defend legal aid might be in order. Only a year or several late, but I'd urge everyone to add their support, write...
Over sensitive
Apologies to anyone who isn't a comment spammer and found themselves blocked from the blog. I was trying out 'Bad Behaviour', which promised to block suspicious activity. It did. It also blocked me. It turned out that a zealous spam IP blacklist that the...
Public Law 2.0
Nick Holmes has a very interesting post at Binary Law on the future of Law publishing in a world of social software. I've been wondering about similar things recently, both in general and in particular, following an examination of my server logs, and Nick...
Spitting feathers
Background. Another disrepair case against a private landlord. Another successful application for default judgement, granted about 6 months ago. Solid evidence. All the directions for quantum hearing complied with by us, to nil response from the landlord....
Divorce for the unmarried.
Interesting to see the Government publicising proposals for setting up property distribution mechanisms for ex-cohabiting couples somewhat ahead of the Law Commission's final report. The Guardian's paper account, if not its online report, compared the...
A positive duty
The Law Society's Defending Legal Aid campaign. Go here and sign up.
Don't get too oppositional
Tessa Shepperson, in an introduction to a Q&A makes a sound point that I think those of us who spend much of their time opposing local authorities tend to forget, which is that the Local Council's tenancy relation services, environmental or housing advice...
Obvious filler 2
Part 2 of what is likely to be an intermittent series, appearing when I'm lazy enough and my logs provide material. Yes, it is time for search engine queries that brought people here, answered by Nearly Legal. And this time round, my earlier advice has been...
Assured trespassers?
[Amended 21 October] After a comment from Olamide Sanni, and a significant number of visitors from housing associations/social landlords turning up in my logs, it is clear that there is a big grey area for tolerated trespassers and the effect of Bristol CC....