tag:theconversation.com,2011:/au/topics/chris-grayling-9367/articles
Chris Grayling – The Conversation
2017-01-23T09:07:10Z
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/71451
2017-01-23T09:07:10Z
2017-01-23T09:07:10Z
Archaeologist: the A303 is a crucial part of Stonehenge’s setting
<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153660/original/image-20170120-5257-omr3r1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">© Pitt Rivers Museum (Accession Number 2012.79.21)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><a href="http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/stonehenge/">Stonehenge</a> has a traffic problem. The A303 has been the UK government’s preferred trunk road from London to the West Country since 1958 – but it runs within 165 metres of the 5,000-year-old monument. Narrowing to a single carriageway, it slows many a summertime car journey. The bottleneck brings noise and pollution, and presents a barrier to exploring the landscape on foot.</p>
<p>On January 12, Transport Secretary Chris Grayling announced plans for a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jan/12/stonehenge-a303-tunnel-chris-grayling-world-heritage-site">Stonehenge Bypass</a>, transforming the A303 into an “<a href="http://www.highways.gov.uk/roads/a303a358-work-to-create-an-expressway-to-the-south-west/">Expressway to the South West</a>”. It involves building a dual carriageway and tunnel across the <a href="http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/373">Stonehenge UNESCO World Heritage Site</a>. As Highways England launched a six-week <a href="https://highwaysengland.citizenspace.com/cip/a303-stonehenge/">public consultation</a> on the plan, the estimated cost of <a href="http://roads.highways.gov.uk/projects/a303-stonehenge-amesbury-and-berwick-down/">£1.4 billion</a> was <a href="https://historicengland.org.uk/whats-new/statements/stonehenge-a303/">heralded by Historic England</a> as “the biggest single investment ever made by government in this country’s heritage”. </p>
<p>But the Stonehenge Bypass is absolutely not in the best interests of cultural heritage.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153658/original/image-20170120-5214-1p6sdft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153658/original/image-20170120-5214-1p6sdft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153658/original/image-20170120-5214-1p6sdft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=330&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153658/original/image-20170120-5214-1p6sdft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=330&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153658/original/image-20170120-5214-1p6sdft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=330&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153658/original/image-20170120-5214-1p6sdft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153658/original/image-20170120-5214-1p6sdft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153658/original/image-20170120-5214-1p6sdft.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=415&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Map of Stonehenge World Heritage Site with route of the proposed bypass and tunnel.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Highways England</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Two old ideas</h2>
<p>The Stonehenge tunnel is, in fact, an old idea. Proposed in the 1989 <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roads_for_Prosperity">Roads for Prosperity</a> government White Paper, which launched the last major programme of roadbuilding in England, over the subsequent three decades arguments over a variety of schemes have multiplied, at an estimated cost of <a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=l9mjU90hoBUC&printsec=frontcover&dq=parker+pearson+stonehenge&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiAuYvR8svRAhUFDcAKHRsCBZ0Q6AEIGjAA#v=onepage&q=%C2%A330%20million&f=false">£30m</a> in consultants’ and lawyers’ fees. </p>
<p>This time around, the project is billed as in the best interests of cultural heritage. The existing road “<a href="https://highwaysengland.citizenspace.com/cip/a303-stonehenge/supporting_documents/S160531%20A303%20Stonehenge%20case%20for%20scheme%20DEC_print.pdf">spoils the setting of Stonehenge</a>”, suggests Highways England. A new road would “improve our understanding and enjoyment of the Stonehenge monument,” chimes the joint National Trust and Historic England <a href="https://historicengland.org.uk/whats-new/statements/stonehenge-a303/">statement</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"821441557857439744"}"></div></p>
<p>Another old idea is being revived hand-in-hand with the tunnel – heritage restoration. The focus is the stones, not their landscape. Stonehenge is reimagined as a Stone Age exhibit untouched by modernity. The A303 would be grassed over at the stones while a new road twice as wide is cut across the World Heritage Site, but tunnelled within the paying visitors’ view. The aesthetics of this “Stonehenge Restored” are determinedly Georgian. A stately monument within rolling lawns from which shuttles run along a new coaching-road between Bath and London. That carriageway hidden from the monument, so customers can stroll an “authentic” landscape of the past, never glimpsing the present.</p>
<h2>A living monument</h2>
<p>Why bury a road? The bypass plans turn back the clock to the kind of temporal connoisseurship widely dismissed since John Ruskin <a href="https://archive.org/stream/lampsofarchseven00ruskrich#page/194/mode/2up">argued in 1849 that</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Neither by the public, nor by those who have the care of public monuments, is the true meaning of restoration understood. It means the most total destruction … a destruction accompanied with false description of the thing destroyed.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>In Ruskin’s alternate vision of a “living monument”, the qualities of age-value and patina emerge through layers built up and eroded through human life and the passage of time. In the 1870s, this became the logic of William Morris’s “Anti-Scrape” movement – the world’s first heritage campaign. Ruskin and Morris understood that erasing later features to restore traces of some imagined original period leads not just to Georgian follies, but to downright misrepresentation.</p>
<p>The 21st-century “scraping” of Stonehenge would conjure the illusion of an unchanging Neolithic relic. But the monument has been a centre of gravity attracting human activity throug five millennia. The mosaic of henges, cursuses, round barrows, inhumations, settlements, enclosures, field systems – and even buildings and roads – represents an ongoing sequence of movement, building, living, and deposition. It’s the prime example of what WG Hoskins famously described as <a href="http://www.le.ac.uk/ebulletin-archive/ebulletin/features/2000-2009/2007/07/nparticle.2007-07-09.html">the “palimpsest” of the English landscape</a>, a layered document repeatedly written over. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153253/original/image-20170118-26585-28yx4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153253/original/image-20170118-26585-28yx4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153253/original/image-20170118-26585-28yx4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=340&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153253/original/image-20170118-26585-28yx4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=340&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153253/original/image-20170118-26585-28yx4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=340&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153253/original/image-20170118-26585-28yx4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153253/original/image-20170118-26585-28yx4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153253/original/image-20170118-26585-28yx4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=428&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Approach to Stonehenge in 1930, from the east: A303 running to the left, A344 (closed 2013) to the right.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">National Archives</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>This story encompasses the A303’s own history: laid out in the early 1800s as the “New Direct Road”, a coaching route from London to Exeter. It was less used from the 1840s with the railway boom, then became a major road from 1933, being defined as a trunk road by the Ministry of Transport in 1958. Stonehenge is not a site or an artefact, but an ever-changing landscape.</p>
<p>Driving west on the A303 today, we glimpse the monument. This modern view is endangered. Since the 1960s, archaeology’s <a href="http://rescue-archaeology.org.uk/">Rescue Movement</a> has defended our past against the threat of destruction from the present day. Today, it is Stonehenge’s modernity that is under threat from a narrow vision of the past.</p>
<p>Hiding the road from the stones would hide the stones from the public. Some <a href="http://www.alva.org.uk/details.cfm?p=423">1.3m people</a> will pass through the Stonehenge giftshop this year, but perhaps ten times that number will witness the monument from a passing vehicle. Those thrilling, often unexpected views may not be celebrated among the iconic experiences of global prehistory, but they are surely among the most democratic. Through these encounters, Stonehenge lives on as a public space. Year by year since the 1980s, public access to Stonehenge has been gradually restricted. This bypass would deal another blow to any chance of seeing the monument without paying the <a href="http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/visit/places/stonehenge/prices-and-opening-times">£15.50 entrance fee</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153341/original/image-20170118-26550-1d8a927.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/153341/original/image-20170118-26550-1d8a927.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=331&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153341/original/image-20170118-26550-1d8a927.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=331&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153341/original/image-20170118-26550-1d8a927.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=331&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153341/original/image-20170118-26550-1d8a927.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153341/original/image-20170118-26550-1d8a927.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/153341/original/image-20170118-26550-1d8a927.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=416&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">‘Stonehenge under threat’: the iconic image of the 1970s Rescue movement. © Rescue, The British Archaeological Trust.</span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Save the A303!</h2>
<p>“Every age has the Stonehenge it deserves – or desires,” wrote visionary archaeologist <a href="https://jacquettahawkes.wordpress.com/">Jacquetta Hawkes</a> in 1967. What do we desire for Stonehenge today? </p>
<p>For some, the tunnel is <a href="https://mikepitts.wordpress.com/2015/10/29/tunnel-truths/">the best compromise</a>. New excavations would add to our understanding of the landscape (and bring jobs for archaeologists). Others call for <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-wiltshire-38666455">a longer tunnel</a>. And some dismiss the project as a destructive “<a href="http://time.com/4632738/uk-government-stonehenge-tunnel/">time-bomb</a>”. After all, with sliproads and dual carriageways, the project could result in <a href="https://twitter.com/ProfDanHicks/status/821673131672829953">a net increase in road surface</a> within the World Heritage Site.</p>
<p>One promising idea is to <a href="http://www.spectator.co.uk/2017/01/the-stonehenge-tunnel-is-monumental-folly/">make the A303 one-way westbound</a>, building an alternative route for eastbound traffic away from the monument – cutting traffic at Stonehenge in half while saving millions. In preserving the A303, that solution reminds us of the ongoing lives of our ancient monuments in the modern world.</p>
<p>Stonehenge’s value lies not just in its prehistory, but also in its modernity. Today, the A303 is a crucial part of the monument’s setting. Yes, we must reduce the traffic. But why hide the stones from the world?</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/71451/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dan Hicks receives funding from the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC). He is an Elected Trustee of the Society of Antiquaries of London.</span></em></p>
Stonehenge has a traffic problem. But building a £1.4 billion tunnel is not the answer.
Dan Hicks, Associate Professor and Curator, Pitt Rivers Museum and School of Archaeology, University of Oxford
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/58610
2016-05-09T11:13:22Z
2016-05-09T11:13:22Z
Fact Check: does Britain get its way at the European top table?
<blockquote>
<p>The UK has never been on the winning side when we have challenged the commission in a vote in the council.</p>
</blockquote>
<p><strong>Chris Grayling, leader of the House of Commons and Vote Leave campaigner, <a href="http://www.voteleavetakecontrol.org/the_renegotiation_has_failed_to_return_powers_to_parliament">in a speech</a> on March 10.</strong> </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Chris Grayling says that our country is never on the winning side whenever there’s a vote at the Council of Ministers when the facts show that we get our way on the vast majority of occasions.</p>
</blockquote>
<p><strong>Alan Johnson, former home secretary and leader of Labour In for Britain, the Labour party’s remain campaign, <a href="http://press.labour.org.uk/post/143435466264/alan-johnson-speech-to-the-usdaw-annual-delegate">in a speech</a> to the USDAW Annual Delegate Conference, Blackpool on April 26.</strong> </p>
<p>The UK is currently the country <a href="http://www.votewatch.eu/blog/special-report-would-brexit-matter-the-uks-voting-record-in-the-council-and-the-european-parliament/">which most often</a> votes “no” in the EU’s Council of Ministers. But it is wrong to suggest that the UK doesn’t generally “win” in the EU Council; recorded opposition in the council is very rare in the first place, and in most cases governments are able to find compromise solutions. This means that all governments – including the UK – are able to support the vast majority of legislation that comes through the council.</p>
<p>If we look at the numbers in more detail, as the graph below shows, we see that since 1999, when legislative records became available to the public for the first time in an accessible format, the UK has voted “no” to legislation on 57 occasions. It has voted “yes” to 2,474 acts and abstained from voting 70 times. </p>
<iframe src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/O4bec/5/" frameborder="0" allowtransparency="true" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" webkitallowfullscreen="webkitallowfullscreen" mozallowfullscreen="mozallowfullscreen" oallowfullscreen="oallowfullscreen" msallowfullscreen="msallowfullscreen" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>This translates into the UK voting “no” on only 2% of legislation – a minority. This can hardly be seen as a case of a country being consistently “outvoted” in the council, as Grayling seems to suggest and as the leave campaign <a href="http://conservativesforbritain.org/2016/01/12/lord-lawson-outlines-the-case-for-leaving-the-eu/">has argued</a> on a number of occasions. </p>
<p>Nevertheless, when we compare the UK votes to other countries in the EU Council, it is clear from the figure that there is a much greater inclination by the UK to voice opposition. The last few years in particular have seen an increase in the number of times the UK votes no or abstains in votes. Examples of policies where the UK has voted no include the <a href="http://data.consilium.europa.eu/doc/document/ST-12774-2003-INIT/en/pdf">regulation of genetically modified products</a>, in agriculture more broadly, and in legislation within justice and home affairs. </p>
<iframe src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/RVWEQ/1/" frameborder="0" allowtransparency="true" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" webkitallowfullscreen="webkitallowfullscreen" mozallowfullscreen="mozallowfullscreen" oallowfullscreen="oallowfullscreen" msallowfullscreen="msallowfullscreen" width="100%" height="500"></iframe>
<p>Conversely, countries such as France are much less likely to record disagreement in the public votes, although they do often voice concern in the <a href="http://www.consilium.europa.eu/register/en/content/out/?RESULTSET=1&DOC_SUBJECT=PV%20CONS&i=MING&ROWSPP=25&DOC_LANCD=EN&ORDERBY=ARCHIVEDATE%20DESC&typ=SET&NRROWS=500&DOC_YEAR=2016">council’s public minutes</a> of their meetings (so-called “formal policy statements” which can be submitted at the time of the vote).</p>
<p><a href="http://cps.sagepub.com/content/early/2016/01/11/0010414015621077.abstract">Recent research</a> has shown that this variation between countries in the council is down to a number of factors. Most notably it corresponds with a country’s political attitudes towards the EU, its economic standing in Europe, and the kind of scrutiny system in place in its national parliaments. Northern countries with liberal market economies which contribute to the EU budget and who have EU-sceptic publics are more likely to vote no in the EU Council. </p>
<p>This indicates that voting in the EU Council can be used to send political signals by countries that dare to “assert” themselves in public. If this wasn’t the case, we could expect opposition by countries who are less powerful in Europe, and whom may be harder affected by the kind of legislation adopted by the EU.</p>
<h2>Verdict</h2>
<p>We can conclude that the UK is clearly an assertive actor in the EU arena, and that UK government ministers have sometimes been outvoted when negotiating EU laws in the EU Council. Nevertheless, in terms of the total volume of legislation passed, the proportion of times the UK government has been on the “losing side” is tiny.</p>
<h2>Review</h2>
<p><em>Nicole Scicluna, Lecturer in Politics and International Relations, University of Birmingham</em></p>
<p>As this fact check demonstrates, it is inaccurate to claim that Britain is never on the “winning” side in votes in the EU Council. On the contrary, all EU member states are on the winning side most of the time, since it is EU Council practice to seek consensus. Nevertheless, it is also true that Britain is in the “losing” minority more often than any other member state.</p>
<p>More broadly, it is too simplistic to reduce the issue of a particular country “getting its way”, or not, to EU Council votes. The ordinary legislative procedure (used for almost all common market matters) requires legislation proposed by the commission to be approved by a qualified majority of states in the council, as well as a simple majority in the European Parliament. Extensive consultations take place before legislation is tabled, so influencing the initial proposal is arguably more important than the final vote.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/58610/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sara Hagemann receives funding from the Economic and Social Research Council. The views expressed here do not represent those of the research councils. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicole Scicluna does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
Chris Grayling and Alan Johnson disagree on whether the UK is on the winning side at the EU Council. Two academics assess who is right.
Sara Hagemann, Assistant Professor, European Institute , London School of Economics and Political Science
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/31391
2014-09-09T15:34:13Z
2014-09-09T15:34:13Z
Chaos in the justice system, but Grayling insists all is ‘going exactly to plan’
<p>It never gets any easier for justice minister Chris Grayling. Every month he seems to face fresh criticism over some new catastrophe in the justice system over which he presides. September is proving no different as he faces a judicial review into his criminal legal aid cuts, is forced to defend his policies on prison and probation in parliament and takes on a House of Commons committee concerned his cuts to legal aid are hurting families.</p>
<p>Grayling would insist that he does not worry about his detractors. They are typically dismissed as being left-wing – as though taking a differing political stance to his slavishly ideological conservatism automatically debars their opinions. His much-derided attempt to curb judicial review is a prime example. He accused lobby groups of turning this process – through which citizens can challenge government decisions – into a <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2413135/CHRIS-GRAYLING-Judicial-review-promotional-tool-Left-wing-campaigners.html">“promotional tool”</a> and a means to delaying government projects of all kinds.</p>
<p>All the same, it is difficult to imagine how he could reflect upon the numerous disasters he has presided over in office and not feel a sense of embarrassment.</p>
<p>He has roused the ire of that most establishment of professional groups, the Bar association. Yet even the sight of bewigged barristers protesting against him in the streets with placards was not enough to shake him.</p>
<p>This week sees solicitors take <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/law/2014/sep/08/chris-grayling-legal-aid-cuts-judicial-review-challenge">Grayling to judicial review</a> claiming the cuts to criminal legal aid were unlawful. While his own lawyers deal with this challenge, Grayling was this morning answering questions on two other areas of his justice portfolio. </p>
<p>Part of his grilling focused on probation, as the service Grayling is dogmatically trying to privatise recently revealed a remarkable level of distrust in him. A survey of 1,000 probation workers saw a staggering 98% claim to have no confidence in the justice secretary. The vast majority said they were considering quitting, dismayed at the manner in which the minister’s reforms were eroding standards and pushing them to compromise on the service they provided.</p>
<p>Dissatisfaction is inevitable when the transition process is so haphazard as to see staff selected to move to private firms based on a lottery – with names <a href="http://www.politics.co.uk/news/2014/07/25/privatisation-lottery-admission-shows-grayling-misled-the-co">literally being picked out of a hat</a>. When pressed, though, Grayling stated that his reforms are “going exactly to plan”.</p>
<p>Grayling was also probed on the <a href="http://www.politics.co.uk/blogs/2014/09/03/the-trouble-with-wormwood-scrubs-how-grayling-created-a-disa">“disaster”</a> he is claimed to have created in the prison system. This followed a damning report the revealed ongoing chaos at Wormwood Scrubs prison, spending cuts that have led to prisoners being locked in their cells for longer and a draconian new regime that included the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/apr/30/prisoners-penalised-book-ban-relationships-prison-reform-trust">notorious prison book ban</a>. </p>
<p>Grayling steadfastly denies that he has plunged prisons into chaos and said that prisons are now “less violent”. This despite the facts showing that serious attacks are higher than at any point in the last five years and incidents involving <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/house-of-lords-27875601">riot squads are up by 60%</a> on 2012-13 figures. Add to that the 88 prisoners who killed themselves last year and the Howard League for Penal Reform’s claim that Grayling has sent the penal system into “meltdown” seems pretty plausible.</p>
<h2>Family law in crisis</h2>
<p>On top of this, the House of Commons Justice Committee has been investigating the impact of cuts to legal aid and all eyes are on Grayling again. The coalition made huge cuts to <a href="http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2012/10/contents/enacted">legal aid</a> in April 2013 in legislation so divisive it was defeated 14 times in the House of Lords and, in the end, only passed because the vote was tied (meaning a government victory).</p>
<p>Personal injury, employment, immigration, debt and housing all suffered but support for private family law cases such as divorce and custody battles was decimated. All funding was taken away except to fund cases that involved domestic violence, forced marriage or child abduction. This meant that those involved in disputes caused by family break up would need to either seek the support of charities (though legal aid cuts are rapidly putting Law Centres out of business), use no-win, no-fee lawyers (despite Grayling also clamping down on these) or pay the eye-watering private practice rates of the legal profession. </p>
<p>In practice, the cuts have led to a massive increase in litigants-in-person – in family law, estranged parents representing themselves over financial issues, residence and access. This has created a two-tier system between those who have legal advice and those who do not. Justice has become a preserve of the rich.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/children-suffer-as-cuts-to-legal-aid-penalise-parents-in-court-9466727.html">Almost half</a> of parents now go into court without legal advice. Instead of being concerned though, the government herald the decline in representation as a triumph, marvelling at how delays have been reduced in the courts and how mediation is quicker and cheaper than ever.</p>
<p>The coalition response flies in the face of the evidence. There has been a <a href="http://www.relate.org.uk/blog/2014/8/01/why-number-legal-aid-funded-mediation-cases-still-dropping">38% decline</a> in meditation over the past year. That’s because without legal advice, couples don’t know that they could and should use the service. Instead, they end up facing each other in court, where they often end up representing themselves and angry at each other. The number of children caught up in legal battles between divorcing parents is running at twice the rate before the cuts. </p>
<p>Cases are taking longer to resolve because litigants-in-person do not understand legal issues and need judges to work through cases with them in the courtroom. Delays are no good for the children involved in these cases, which in itself, contravenes the rule that their welfare must always come first. The reality is that a government which claims to put family first is failing innocent children, who have become the unfortunate by-standers in their parents’ disputes.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/31391/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Daniel Newman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
It never gets any easier for justice minister Chris Grayling. Every month he seems to face fresh criticism over some new catastrophe in the justice system over which he presides. September is proving no…
Daniel Newman, RA, Sustainable Places Research Institute, Cardiff University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.
tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/24245
2014-03-11T15:38:57Z
2014-03-11T15:38:57Z
Barristers at the barricades, while justice minister is in the dock over legal cuts
<p>There may never be a more <a href="http://www.parliament.uk/documents/joint-committees/human-rights/Legal_Aid_Inquiry_Transcript_Grayling_261113.pdf">appropriate epitaph</a> for Chris Grayling’s time as justice secretary than that offered when he addressed the Joint Committee on Human Rights last year. As committee chair, <a href="http://www.hywelfrancis.co.uk/">Hywel Francis</a> said, Grayling’s views relating to people’s access to justice are those of “a man who knows the price of everything, yet the value of nothing”. </p>
<p>As Francis acknowledged, that pithy put down originated with Oscar Wilde, and was intended to describe a philistine; only, in Grayling’s case, it was not offered as a jibe about his lack of cultural refinement but rather the sheer disinterest in issues of justice. Whether or not he has finely developed aesthetic values is neither here nor there, but the lack of regard he shows for the values of due process and the equality of arms are of utmost importance considering that this is the man tasked with looking after the British justice system, which will likely never again be tagged with the once-popular axiom of being the best in the world.</p>
<p>Since taking over from the rather more liberal, Kenneth Clarke Grayling has <a href="http://www.conservativepartyconference.org.uk/Speeches/2013_Chris_Grayling.aspx">attacked human rights</a> as “political correctness”, <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-20709392">proposed dramatic restrictions</a> to the right of individuals to challenge the state through judicial review, <a href="http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/590f8cdc-3b36-11e3-87fa-00144feab7de.html#axzz2vaRA7pzN">imposed significant restrictions</a> on access to lawyers with no-win no-fee cases, <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10552614/Chris-Grayling-plans-to-build-Britains-biggest-prison.html">moved the government back</a> on to the course of building more (and bigger) prisons – <a href="https://theconversation.com/when-it-comes-to-prisons-big-is-not-necessarily-beautiful-17901">despite the evidence against them</a> – and is set on <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/graylings-probation-reforms-could-have-the-biggest-impact-of-all-9174268.html">dramatically privatising</a> up to 70% of the probation service ceding state responsibility for offenders to commercial enterprises. </p>
<p>He has <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2014/01/how-legal-aid-cuts-are-harming-voiceless-and-most-vulnerable">already decimated</a> civil legal aid, with a set of proposals so controversial that they were defeated 14 times in the House of Lords, so that the majority of cases in areas such as divorce, housing and benefits are no longer funded. The civil budget was <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2014/01/how-legal-aid-cuts-are-harming-voiceless-and-most-vulnerable">slashed by a quarter</a>, some £320m.</p>
<h2>Brief interlude</h2>
<p>Grayling is attempting similar with crime and last week saw the <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26472809">first full day barrister walk-out</a> in the history of England and Wales – it really is an impressive feat to push that most august and refined of professions to the barricades, placards in hand. Cast as a <a href="http://www.legalvoice.org.uk/2014/03/07/grayling-day-protest-a-day-of-shame-for-the-lord-chancellor/">day of shame for Grayling</a>, the action was a strike in all but name; barristers and solicitors taking to the street as they refused to act in court following the Ministry of Justice confirming its <a href="http://www.lawgazette.co.uk/practice/grayling-unveils-final-package-of-criminal-legal-aid-reforms/5040114.article">package of cuts</a> to the criminal legal aid budget. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/law/2013/dec/06/solicitors-walkout-legal-aid-fees-protest-barristers">Fees will be cut</a> by up to 30% in an effort to dislodge £220m from the annual bill. There will also be a tendering process for contracts offered to firms of solicitors that can claim, at least, 20% efficiency cuts on present levels, which will lead to a two-thirds reduction in the number of firms. </p>
<p>Contracting will create <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/law/2013/apr/01/legal-aid-cuts">advice deserts</a>, with large swaths of the population unserved by a local law firm. As it stands, a vital part of running an effective practice comes from lawyers either having prior knowledge of their clients or, at least, understanding the issues and cultures of the communities from which they are drawn. This means lawyers can quickly get a handle on the client’s needs.</p>
<p>Those defendants that still live near law firms may be in for a nasty surprise as lawyers increasingly have to work to <a href="https://theconversation.com/cuts-to-criminal-legal-aid-will-turn-defendants-into-products-21666">sausage factory</a> processes of representation: churning a large volume of clients through their doors in order to reach toward profitability. The notion of personalised service will go out of the window, especially so as the proposals include a financial (dis)incentive whereby lawyers can be rewarded for early guilty pleas, encouraging them to push their clients to admit offences.</p>
<h2>Justice not a private function</h2>
<p>Taking all this into account it was interesting to listen to what Grayling had to say for himself at the Policy Exchange when he joined a panel <a href="http://www.policyexchange.org.uk/modevents/item/privatising-justice-myths-threats-opportunities-with-chris-grayling">debating the privatising of justice</a>. Fundamentally, Grayling’s various reforms while justice secretary can be labelled privatisations – whether in name as with the offender rehabilitation services and the super prisons, or in effect, by facilitating a two-tier system of legal representation whereby private justice buys better (or any) lawyers. He defended these moves as promoting creativity through removing the supposed constraints of the public sector. Grayling did, though, notably stop short at the courts, which he said would not be privatised (though would be afforded greater freedom somehow).</p>
<p>Addressing the companies that would be brought into areas such as probation and prison, he defended payment by results as inherently sensible and said the central issue for the Ministry of Justice would be how effective they were in reducing reoffending. That benchmark seems to ignore the <a href="http://www.prisonreformtrust.org.uk/Portals/0/Documents/Prisonthefacts.pdf">figures on recidivism amongst the prison population</a>, that his predecessor Kenneth Clarke understood but, all the same, he stuck to this position. </p>
<p>Grayling’s faith in the power of the market is impressive in that it affords him the confidence to outsource something as crucial as liberty to G4S, who failed to even properly manage crowds gathered to watch a few people running and jumping. In the name of cost cutting, less experienced staff is hired on lower wages to supervise greater numbers of inmates with the very real prospect that prisoners come out in a worse situation than when they went in. Grayling’s attitude is that he will somehow take into account such medium- to long-term impacts in enough time to make a meaningful impact on the contract at the time. This seems to suggest some degree of anticipation, when all the experts are already engaged in such predictive activity and warn him against moving towards privatisation in areas such as probation.</p>
<p>Our justice secretary, then, seems determined to press on with his intention to reform our legal system in the round. Whether this is due to ideology, austerity or some combination of the two, what is clear is that the policies Grayling has led will have massive and long-lasting effects. His decisions now should resonate far in the future and, though it will not necessarily be fondly, his time in the job will probably endure in the consciousness of legal professionals and those who rely on the justice system far more profoundly than the performance of those who held the office before him.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/24245/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Daniel Newman does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>
There may never be a more appropriate epitaph for Chris Grayling’s time as justice secretary than that offered when he addressed the Joint Committee on Human Rights last year. As committee chair, Hywel…
Daniel Newman, RA, Sustainable Places Research Institute, Cardiff University
Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.