The Court of Appeal has ruled today (Monday) that those who have not resided lawfully in the UK for at least a year are not entitled to receive free health service treatment. Lord Justice Ward said: “Failed asylum seekers ought not to be here. They should never have come here in the first place and […]
Category: Politics
It’s the End of the Father as we Know Him (and I Feel Fine)
It’s another blow to fatherhood, the traditional family, and all things good and pure, squeals the Daily Heil.* What could raise such spleen? By the looks of it, it’s Part 2 of the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act (2008), although the paper doesn’t have the good grace to provide a link. This piece of legislation reduces […]
Purdy and the Role of the Law
Having spent a chunk of my weekend reading the Purdy ruling, one of the things that it seems to illustrate is the way in which ethics and law sometimes seem to come apart. The ruling notes that Purdy and Puente are faced with “an impossible dilemma”, and that “although Mr Puente would be willing to […]
Drugs are Bad, m’kaaaay?
As widely predicted, the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs has advised that ecstasy be downgraded from a class-A to a class-B drug. This comes in the wake of the Council’s chair, David Nutt, suggesting that ecstasy ought to be considered no more dangerous than horse-riding. (The full article can be found here, but for non-institutional readers, a […]
Shit Priorities
Here’s a handful of moral statements that, I guess, many people would take to be trivially true: We ought to save lives where possible; Saving more lives is better than saving fewer; It is a good thing to save lives as efficiently as possible; Saving lives is more important than improving tolerable lives. Nothing too […]
MP Not at all Dyslexic
Graham Stringer, the Labour MP for Blackley, has dismissed dyslexia as a myth invented to cover up for poor teaching. His claim brings to mind a claim reported a few years ago along the same lines made by Durham’s Julian Elliott. I’m not sure if it’s just a matter of the way in which the […]
S. and Marper v. the UK 17 – 0 for civil liberties and common sense
The European Court of Human Rights have today in a unanimous 17 – 0 decision decided that the retention of DNA profiles and tissue samples from people who have been arrested, but not charged with or convicted of any crime is a breach of their right to respect for private life (Article 8 of the […]
Fit notes? Undecaffeinated coffee?
I’m not sure whether it’s an urban legend or actual fact, but I once heard a story about someone who was offered coffee on an aeroplane in either decaffeinated or undecaffeinated versions. Oh, how I laughed at the mindless pleonasm. I only mention it because I was awoken this morning by the sound of someone talking […]
Personhood in Colorado: Update
I’m not sure if it’s definite yet, but at time of writing (10am GMT on the fifth), it looks like Colorado voters have overwhelmingly rejected proposals to alter the constitution to extend the definition of “person” to the point of fertilisation. Would it be too provocative to express happiness about this small victory for moral and […]
There’s going to be some kind of vote in America…
You may be aware that some Americans are going to be casting votes on… oh, something or other, this week. In Colorado, they’ll be doing the presidential shtick – but they’ll also be voting on whether to accept an amendment to the State constitution that would extend the definition of “person” to include all humans […]