There will never be a time where confusion does not rule on issues of sex. An Irish poet has defended his having sex with young Nepalese men, citing âfull ageâ? as a defence to charges of sex tourism at the least.
What cannot be denied is that sexual standards differ between the sexes, and, probably, professions. Few would defend a doctor who had a sexual relationship with a patient. The issue is, of course, abuse of power.
Women are different, as we see from a survey of British nurses.
THE OFFICE PREMISES ACT 1958
This Act applies to any premises, room, suite of rooms or other part of premises in which persons are employed in clerical work. (S. 3) Clerical work includes book-keeping, sorting and filing, typing, document reproduction, machine calculating, drawing, and the handling of mail, telephone and telegraph operating and the handling of money. (S. 2)
The Act requires;
I) the daily removal of dirt and waste;
2) no overcrowding;
3) a reasonable temperature in each room;
4) effective and suitable ventilation to provide fresh air;
5) effective and suitable lighting;
6) windows to be cleaned;
7) suitable arrangements to avoid discomfort or glare to the eyes of workers;
8 ) sanitary conveniences for the workers;
9) use discontinued where the enforcing authority certifies the office is unsuitable;
10) all floors, steps, stairs, lifts, passages and gangways of sound construction and properly maintained;
11) when persons are inside no doors may be locked unless easily and immediately capable of being opened from the inside;
12) fire escape routes to be marked in red letters of adequate size;
13) employees to be familiar with the fire escape routes and fire drill;
14) a supply of drinking water;
15) adequate, clean and orderly washing facilities;
16) suitable sitting facilities for sedentary- type work;
17) a first-aid box to be provided;
The enforcing authority in the case of offices occupied by the State and factories under the Factories Act 1955 (except enforcement of S. 13 of the Office Premises Act which is enforceable by the Sanitary Authority) is the Minister for Industry and Commerce and in every other case it is the Sanitary Authority.
Wikipedia defines âhuman natureâ? as;
human nature is the fundamental nature and substance of humans, as well as the range of human behavior that is believed to be invariant over long periods of time and across very different cultural contexts.
In Jersey a scandal has emerged.
Firstly, there is abundant evidence of serious child abuse in Haut de la Garenne childrenâs home. Human remains have been found in the premises.
Secondly, the police are interviewing former child inmates and other witnesses relating to the premises and have made the following statement;
Part of the inquiry will be the fact that a lot of the victims tried to report their assaults but for some reason or another they were not dealt with as they should be,â? he said.
We are looking at allegations that a number of agencies didnât deal with things as perhaps they should, we are looking at all the agencies.â?
Should we not ask; was the police force one of the agencies?
The police statement is itself misleading. The police investigate crime (we hope); is it a crime to neglect your duty? If it is not, why are the police suggesting that they are investigating âthe agenciesâ?? Is that not a PR stance by the police?
The title of this post is not a reference to the capacity for evil by individual abusers, but the incorrigible tendency for institutions to be corrupted and to pervert their original purpose. In short, there is an appreciable probability that, in any particular case, an institution charged with a purpose will be used to defeat that purpose.
Consider this; in the writerâs experience when the word âindependentâ? is associated with the title of any institution, it is invariably the case that the institution is not âindependentâ?.
The House of Lords has just endorsed the decision in R v Morais (1988) 87 Cr App R 9. In that case the judge had given leave to prefer a voluntary bill against the accused, who was arraigned on six counts in the bill. The accused pleaded not guilty, was convicted on four counts and was sentenced. Relying on the Administration of Justice (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1933, he appealed on the ground that the bill had never been signed by the proper officer: without a signature, he argued, there could be no indictment, and without an indictment there could be no valid trial.
In Morais the Court of Appeal agreed with the submission. The court endorsed a statement of Peter Pain J in an earlier case:
It seems to us that it is impossible for a criminal trial to start without there being a valid indictment to which the defendant can plead, and that the bill of indictment does not become an indictment until it is signed”.
In Ireland the relevant legislation is the Criminal Justice (Administration) Act 1924. It mandates the form of the indictment in the Act and in the First Schedule to the Act. The choice of indictment is limited to the charges expressed or implied in the documents known as the âBook of Evidenceâ? served on the accused.
The 1924 Act permits amendment of an indictment before the conclusion of the trial but neither this power nor the restriction on the defence to take issue with the form of the indictment will avail if the situation in Morais is present, for the reason that, until it is signed, the indictment is not an indictment.
The Irish property market has slowed if not stopped. According to the Irish Times the construction sector owes â¬100 billion to Irish banks.
In these circumstances there will be considerable pressure to avoid making due payment on contracts, not to speak of an inability to absorb the cost of contractorsâ or developersâ errors.
In short, the frequency of disputes in the sector is sure to rise.
At the retail level they will not get to the level of the scandal in Spain, where the Guardian reported:
Britons are being scared off buying property on Spain’s Mediterranean coast, with the number of potential buyers plummeting after a series of corruption and planning scandals and the announcement of plans to demolish thousands of illegally built homes.â?
They will, however, get to the level where subsidiary agreements will appear and misunderstandings will grow.
The standard source of building agreements in Ireland is the suite of contracts devised by the Royal Institute of Architects in Ireland, some of which are listed HERE.
In the UK the standard source of building agreements is the suite of contracts devised by the Joint Contracts Tribunal Ltd. listed and downloadable HERE.
For Irish sub-contractors (nominated) the Construction Industry Federation form is used.
What happens when the disputes break out? That depends on the form of contract and indeed, the terms of the contract.
Many parties to these disputes fail to understand that the dispute is a legal dispute and that the terms of the agreement will, in principle, if not in practice, dictate the outcome of the dispute. In short, the contract is the source of the partiesâ rights and obligations and the dispute will consist of teasing out the point on which one of the parties failed in its legal obligations, as defined by the contract/s.
This is not to say that parties can and do settle disputes on a practical basis, rather than a legal basis.
When this happens the experience can resemble THERAPY rather than law.
It is important to recognize that the expense of construction (which is considerable) carries the hidden reciprocal cost of the dispute and that the parties should budget for spending that money if and when the dispute breaks out. If that is budgeted for there will be a minimized loss of momentum in driving the dispute resolution process to an early conclusion.
The similarities between Bertie Ahern and Warren G Harding are not complete. Bertie Ahern is clever, whereas Harding was not. Harding was handsome, whereas Bertie Ahern is not. However they resemble each other in an ability to mangle language. It is reported of Harding:
His liabilities were not at first so apparent, yet they were disastrously real. Beyond the limited scope of his political experience he was “almost unbelievably ill-informed,” as William Allen White put it. His mind was vague and fuzzy. Its quality was revealed in the clogged style of his public addresses, in his choice of turgid and maladroit language (“non-involvement” in European affairs, “adhesion” to a treaty), and in his frequent attacks of suffix trouble (“normalcy” for normality, “betrothment” for betrothal).â?
They also resemble each other in their resort to companions whom it would be better to avoid, given the readiness to offer, and in the case of Bertie Ahern and Harding, to accept, âpolitical donations for personal useâ?.
In the case of Jess Smith, the right hand man for Hardingâs Attorney General, Daugherty, he set a fish bowl on a table in the centre of an hotel room and secretly watched from the next room while âfriendsâ? of the Administration entered the room and left money in the bowl.
Bertieâs friends, in one aspect, belong to the Harding era; they attack the Mahon Tribunal and its counsel without regard for the fact that the Tribunal and its counsel are doing their jobs and the stink is from the material uncovered and not from the methods of discovery. The unarticulated premise in 1924 and now, is the determination to defend the status quo. Here is an account of the Harding scandals;
When the oil scandals were first spread across the front pages of the
newspapers, early in 1924, there was a wave of excitement sufficient to
force the resignations of Denby and Daugherty and to bring about the
appointment by the new President, Calvin Coolidge, of special
Government counsel to deal with the oil cases. But the harshest
condemnation on the part of the press and the public was reserved, not
for those who had defrauded the government, but for those who insisted on bringing the facts to light. Senator Walsh, who led the investigation of the oil scandals, and Senator Wheeler, who investigated the Department of justice, were called by the New York Tribune “the Montana scandalmongers.” The New York Evening Post called them mud-gunners.” The New York Times, despite its Democratic leanings, called them “assassins of character.” In these and other newspapers throughout the country one read of the “Democratic lynching-bee” and “poison-tongued partisanship, pure malice, and twittering hysteria,” and the inquiries were called “in plain words, contemptible and disgusting.”
Newspaper-readers echoed these amiable sentiments. Substantial business men solemnly informed one another that mistakes might have been made but that it was unpatriotic to condemn them and thus to “cast discredit on the Government,” and that those who insisted on probing them to the bottom were “nothing better than Bolsheviki.” One of the leading super-patriots of the land, Fred R. Marvin of the Key Men of America, said the whole oil scandal was the result of “a gigantic international conspiracy . . . of the internationalists, or shall we call them socialists and communists?” A commuter riding daily to New York from his suburb at this period observed that on the seven-o’clock train there was some indignation at the scandals, but that on the eight-o’clock train there was only indignation at their exposure and that on the nine-o’clock train they were not even mentioned. When, a few months later, John W. Davis, campaigning for the Presidency on the Democratic ticket, made political capital of the Harding scandals, the opinion of the majority seemed to be that what he said was in bad taste, and Davis was snowed under at the polls. The fact was that any relentless investigation of the scandals threatened to disturb, if only slightly, the status quo, and disturbance of the status quo was the last thing that the dominant business class or the country at large wanted.â?
Bertieâs friends are particularly brazen in claiming âunfair proceduresâ? on the part of the Tribunal. Of what do they think cross-examination consists? Do they think counsel should write down his questions and give advance notice of them in that format? And not deviate from the script?
In âThe Art of Cross-Examinationâ? by Francis L. Wellman the author records the cross-examination, in 1911, of Congressman Foelker by Max Steuer in The People v Gardner. Gardner was accused of offering bribes to New York State politicians and in particular to then State Senator Foelker, to vote against a proposal to ban racetrack betting. Foelker testified that Gardner offered him $3,000 in a private room on a train from Albany to New York to vote against the proposal.
Steuer cross-examined;
STEUER: Parlez-vous Francais?
FOELKER: What did you say?
STEUER: Parlez-vous Francais?
FOELKER: I donât know what you are getting at.
STEUER: It seems to me that you should at least be able to say oui, in view of the fact that you passed an examination in French with a grade of one hundred per cent. You recall taking the Regentsâ examination so as to qualify for the Bar examination?
Steuer went on to explore the oddities of Foelkerâs qualification to practice law. Foelker had passed an examination in logarithms and advanced algebra with a grade of 95%; he could not say what a logarithm was. He had passed an examination in syntax with a grade of 98%; he could not define syntax. He could not recall where he had sat his Regentsâ examination. He did not recall what kind of building it was or where it was located. He was sure he had never taken an examination in French and could not account for the Regentsâ record that he had passed French with a grade of 100%. He admitted he had never studied logarithms or advanced algebra. He could not account for the terrible mistake of the Regents in giving him such high percentages in subjects in which he had never passed an examination. He could not account for the fact that his examination papers were missing from the records in Albany but he certainly had nothing to do with their disappearance.
He admitted that he received $2,500 from a man who had a bill pending in the legislature for the sprinkling of the streets and, that he, Foelker, had voted in favour of the bill and the man later received the contract for the sprinkling of the streets. His explanation for the receipt of the cheque was that the man sent it to him as a campaign contribution. It was of course true that the man did not live in Brooklyn where Foelker was a candidate nor could he distinctly remember that he had ever met the man, but he accepted campaign contributions, no matter from whom they came, without inquiry, because that was the custom among members of the legislature.
The date in the title is the date of the dissolution of the Red Headed League, as recorded by Dr. Watson in his almost eponymous account (âthe Adventure of the Red Headed Leagueâ?).
What I had forgotten is that the landlord of 7 Popeâs Court Fleet St., the HQ of the League, recorded his tenant as being a solicitor, William Morris.
Morris was, probably, a counterfeit solicitor. Even so, as remarked by Dr. Watsonâs companion, he had benefitted Mr. Wilson, the red-headed pensioner by £30, and a deep knowledge of every subject coming under the letter “A” in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, before abruptly dissolving the League and ending Mr. Wilsonâs income.
On these facts, Holmes had difficulty discovering the meaning of the events.
As far as I have heard, it is impossible for me to say whether the present case is an instance of crime or not, but the course of events is certainly among the most singular that I have ever listened to.â?
Watsonâs account is, thereafter, the account of the search for the meaning of the events, which, of course, was conditioned by the intentions of Morris, the solicitor, and his companions. That account should not be looked for here; it is better recorded by Watson.
The life of a barrister is odd. It has always been odd. Here is part of an account (from 1742) of the life of Chief Justice Saunders (all judges were former barristers):
The Lord Chief Justice Saunders succeeded in the Room of Pemberton. His Character, and his Beginning, were equally strange. He was at first no better than a poor Beggar Boy, if not a Parish Foundling, without known Parents, or Relations. He had found a way to live by Obsequiousness (in Clement’s Inn, as I remember) and courting the Attornies Clerks for Scraps. The extraordinary Observance and Diligence of the Boy, made the Society willing to do him good. He appeared very ambitious to learn to write; and one of the Attornies got a Board knocked up at a Window on the Top of the Staircase; and that was his Desk, where he sat and wrote after Copies of Court and other Hands the Clerks gave him. He made himself so expert a Writer that he took in Business, and earned some Pence by Hackney-writing. And thus, by degrees, he pushed his Faculties, and fell to Forms, and by Books that were lent him, became an exquisite entering Clerk; and by the same course of Improvement of himself, an able Counsel, first in special Pleading, then, at large. And after he was called to the Bar, had Practice, in the King’s Bench Court, equal with any there. As to his Person, he was very corpulant and beastly; a mere Lump of morbid Flesh. He used to say, “by his Troggs,” (such an humourous Way of talking he affected) “none could say he wanted Issue of his Body, for he had nine in his Back.” He was a fetid Mass, that offended his Neighbours at the Bar in the sharpest degree. Those, whose ill Fortune it was to stand near him, were Confessors, and in Summer-time, almost Martyrs. This hateful Decay of his Carcase came upon him by continual Sottishness; for, to say nothing of Brandy, he was seldom without a Pot of Ale at his Nose, or near him.
Roger North; Life of Francis North, Baron Guildford (1742)
THE HIGH COURT
2006 No. 3785P
Between
DIGITAL RIGHTS IRELAND LIMITED
Plaintiff
And
THE MINISTER FOR COMMUNICATIONS, MARINE AND NATURAL RESOURCES, THE MINISTER FOR JUSTICE, EQUALITY AND LAW REFORM, THE COMMISSIONER FOR THE GARDA SIOCHANA, IRELAND AND THE ATTORNEY GENERAL
Defendants
UPDATE (18/2/2008)
1. There are currently three Motions before the High Court. They are, currently, appearing in Court 1 Distillery Church St. Dublin 7.
2. The first motion (in time) is the Motion of the Irish Human Rights Commission for leave to appear as amicus curiae.
3. The second motion (in time) is a motion from the State challenging, firstly, the locus standi of the Plaintiff to bring the proceedings and secondly seeking an order directing the Plaintiff to provide security for costs.
4. The third motion (in time) is a motion from the Plaintiff seeking, firstly directions as to the trial of the issues and secondly seeking an order of reference to the European Court of Justice.
5. These motions have been adjourned to 10th March 2008 for the purposes of deciding the time and order of trial of the issues arising on the Motions.
While the Plaintiff was employed by the Defendant as a labourer, he lifted a bundle of timber onto his shoulder and suffered severe pain in his lower back. He was taken, in pain, to hospital where he remained for two weeks. He was diagnosed as having a slipped disc and eventually he had an operation which improved matters. He reached a condition in which he was compelled to discontinue working for the Defendant. He was unable to sit in a soft chair, kick a football or ride a bicycle. He could not bend to lift his young child.
