Challenging the decline of liberty. Against censorship, coercion & collectivism. For free markets, free nations & free people. Author of The Green Cage.
In the UK today, free expression is narrowing. Peaceful critics face raids, gagging orders, and restrictions on what they can say online. Speech is increasingly treated not as a right, but as a risk to be managed.
Climate policy is vital — but when it becomes a shield for censorship or a tool of control, it raises profound questions about liberty. The danger is not environmental action itself, but the willingness of authorities to suppress dissent in its name.
That is the world I explore in The Green Cage. A dystopian novel set in a society where environmental rhetoric justifies surveillance, obedience, and silence.
It is fiction — but intended as a warning. Once speech is conditional, democracy becomes fragile. If we cannot debate freely, we cannot govern freely.
https://t.co/dmXzRkq7MO
Bar leaders’ statement on government’s response to the Leveson review of criminal courts
We fundamentally disagree with the government’s plan to restrict the deeply entrenched constitutional principle of a jury trial.
The government faces two problems: bearing on the backlog and ensuring we’re never in this position again. We support efforts to do that but have seen no evidence that curtailing jury trials will solve either problem.
We do not see how restricting jury trials will have an impact on the existing backlog. The government itself acknowledged on numerous occasions this week that this proposal will not make a difference any time soon. It hinges on Sir Brian Leveson’s recommendation which has not been piloted or thoroughly modelled.
Crown Courts such as Liverpool have shown that efficiencies and investment of time and resources do make a difference. In Wales, there’s no meaningful backlog due to close and effective co-operation between the Bench and Bar. All the efficiencies we suggested in January – including different case management and defendant delivery time, that have also been recommended by Sir Brian Leveson – do not require legislation. We know they work and would have an impact now.
Resources need to be focused on rebuilding the system and allowing other measures to embed.
Criminal trials being decided by a single judge goes further than the recommendation by Sir Brian which recognised the importance of judgement by peers. The Lord Chancellor’s own 2017 report made plain that juries are free from bias and provide diversity.
This draconian approach undermines such a well-founded sentiment and attacks a constitutional freedom namely, trial by jury.
Barbara Mills KC, Chair of the Bar Council
Kirsty Brimelow KC, Vice Chair of the Bar Council
Riel Karmy-Jones KC, Chair of the Criminal Bar Association
Andrew Thomas KC, Vice Chair of the Criminal Bar Association
Claire Davies KC, Leader of the South Eastern Circuit
Jaime Hamilton KC, Leader of the Northern Circuit
Sarah Jones KC, Leader of the Western Circuit
Jason Pitter KC, Leader of the North Eastern Circuit
Caroline Rees KC, Leader of the Wales and Chester Circuit
Harpreet Sandhu KC, Leader of the Midland Circuit
Lachlan Stewart, Chair of the Bar Council Young Barristers’ Committee
@Kirsty_Brimelow@TheCriminalBar@NECircuitleader@ne_circuit@SECircuit@CircuitNorth@WandCcircuit@midland_circuit@YoungBarristers
@RupertLowe10 Agreed. We are literally the most surveilled country on planet earth. Finding someone is not an issue. It’s the gateway to full control over the law abiding British citizens.
I firmly oppose the government’s plans for compulsory digital ID cards.
This is an affront to our civil liberties, and will make the lives of minorities even more difficult and dangerous.
It is excessive state interference — and must be resisted.
Digital ID is ABSOLUTELY not a safeguard - it is the key infrastructure of control.
Once the state holds the keys to identity, access, and movement, every freedom becomes conditional on compliance with Government policy.
Anyone in favour must look at the reality in China.
One of the deadliest results of socialism was Mao’s so-called ‘Great Leap Forward’ in China between 1958 and 1962.
The government forced farmers into collective farms, banned people from growing their own food, and lied about crop yields to impress party leaders. Officials even took grain away from starving villages to fill quotas.
Around 40 million people died in a man-made famine.
Why is socialism not talked about in the same way fascism is?