Bins or Legal Aid for the Poor and Needy?

Eric Pickles announced in time for the Labour Party conference that the government had found in a dusty corner £250 million at a time when the country is allegedly bankrupt so that we can have a waste bin collection each week, instead of once a fortnight. 

I heard this jewel on the radio and thought, wow, the Lord has spoken. We have been blessed with such a gift from the angelic host on high, the benevolent coalition government. I had waited all year for this news.

When you think that the same government - not the lovely Mr Eric Pickles but the demonic Mr. Ken Clarke is planning to wipe out the rights of the poor to get legal aid in most areas including community welfare, in order to make savings in the Ministry of Justice of £350 million. It is a drop in the ocean, yet the government have decided that the rights of the poor to get much needed legal advice are no where near as important as giving the public a bin delivery every week rather than once a fortnight.

If they can find £250 million in a corner for bins, why on earth do they need to take legal aid away. It just doesn't make any sense at all and makes my blood boil. It is just an excuse to enforce the government's obvious dislike for lawyers, at the expense of the poor and the needy claimant who has been the victim of negligence by the NHS. The message is that the government are above the law, and can injure patients without the recourse to rightful compensation.

As it was said at the TUC, the austerity policies of this government are just an excuse to make cuts that are endemic to conservative party policy.

So bins or the rights of the poor? Difficult one hey.........I think it is a load of stinking rubbish.

Eclipse Personal Injury Awards 2011

Amazingly we have got into the finals again of the Eclipse Personal Injury Awards 2011, which will be hosted at the Park Plaza Riverbank Hotel London on 24th November at a glitzy awards ceremony.

I am in the finals for Personal Injury Lawyer of the Year, and Paul Durkin is shorlisted for outstanding case of the year. Paul's case is AB v Nugent Care & GR v Wirral BC 29/07/2009 [2009] EWCA Civ 827, which clarified the law of Limitation in child abuse cases and afforded the opportunity for more victims of historic abuse to exercise their rights to claim compensation.

To view our other awards click here

So wish us luck!

It is excellent to be in the Law Society Excellence Award Finals

I am frankly quite amazed that Abney Garsden McDonald are in the finals of the Law Society Excellence Awards 2011 - see this link - http://services.lawsociety.org.uk/events/awards/excellence/shortlist-2011. We have been shortlisted for Client Service, Innovation, and Environmental Responsibility in the firm awards, and I have been shortlisted for Solicitor of the Year (Private Client). You can also read our press release.

When you think that there are 118,000 solicitors with practising certificates, it is an unbelievable achievement and makes me feel quite proud. Whether or not we actually win anything, is another thing all together. If I were a cynic, and I am, then all these awards are simply methods of selling tickets for a big bun fight on 18th October at a hall called Old Billingsgate in London. At £225 + VAT each they are not cheap. Mind you it does include a free glass of champagne and half a bottle of wine each, so no complaints there. 

When you think about it though, everyone wins don't they? The 3rd parties who are trying to sell to us ,sponsor awards, and get publicity. If you are shortlisted, as we are, it is good publicity even if you don't win, and if you win, well the world is your lobster as the saying doesn't go. If you work for a firm who are shortlisted, it is  nice day out in London, and a free day away from work. So who is complaining? I am because it will cost me about £2,500, but there again, I probably should be on "Grumpy Old Men"

Why did we get shortlisted? Well we went paperless in September 2010 and are saving trees, which is where the Environment bit comes in. We do child abuse compensation cases, which require a very special approach to the client, who need very careful handling, which is the client service bit. I designed a special case management system to deal with our abuse cases, and run group actions, which is where the innovation comes in.

Why am I nominated for Solicitor of the Year? Good question. Well probably for the same reason that I am still sitting here after the office has closed writing this blog, when I should be at home with my family. But there again, they are used to it by now. I get it from my grandfather, who used to drum into me when I was a little boy. "Peter, if a job is worth doing, it is worth doing properly." May you rest in peace Grandad. I just wish, I could make a balls of things sometimes.

So, we are all trooping down to London on 18th October, so wish us luck. If we don't have to buy lots of bubbly, then we didn't do well. If I get sozzled then it was a successful evening. Shame I am not really a drinker, but that is probably my father's fault, because Grandad did like his whiskey......

How horrible is the "Little Shop of Horrors"?

The simple answer to the question in the title is "not horrible at all". Why? Because it is not a horror musical, but a rather charming story of a boy/girl relationship looking good until the second Act when horror begins to strike. It was performed by my daughter when she was doing stage school at Upstage Macclesfield, one week in the summer of 2006, where the age range was 7 to 16. So, if it's good enough for kids, it's good enough for me and thee.

Why am I writing about this famous off Broadway musical? Because I am in it of course. Macclesfield Majestic Theatre Group present "Little Shop of Horrors" at MADS Theatre, Lord Street, Macclesfield between 3rd and 8th October 2011 with shows at 7.30pm Monday to Saturday with 2pm matinee on the Saturday. Be there, or sit at home and watch the goggle box, until your backside takes over the settee. Your choice of course, but I know what I would do, if I were you. To book tickets, go to their website www.mmtg.co.uk You can also see some fabulous promotional pictures taken by our secretary's brother, which were so brilliant, they got us a full page article in the Macc Express on the Your Life page. Success.

What is it about? You have to undertand that I would love to tell you, but the plot is a surprise known to only the select few. If I tell all, then you won't come, because you will know, and resort to the couch bottom spreading activity that we all indulge in most of the time. Also, if I told you, I would have to kill you of course, and who knows a good solicitor these days? Not me by jove.

OK then, just a sneaky peak. To quote my press release, "The show is about an orphaned shop assistant (Seymour), who, one day, discovers a “strange and interesting plant”. He calls it Audrey II after his shop assistant work mate, with whom he is in love. The owner of the shop, Mr. Mushnik (played by me) is doleful, mean and distrustful of the new plant until customers show an interest, and his flower shop starts making money. The plant needs feeding, Seymour discovers, unusual food. The plant grows, and grows, until it becomes a national sensation. The rest has to be a surprise for the audience who will be enthralled with the fabulous music, which is a mixture of rock and roll, ballads, and catchy melodies."

I have taken the show so seriously, that I have grown a special moutache for the part. The last time I had a moustache was just before playing "Widow Twankey" in Aladdin at Cheadle Hulme School about 14 years ago....er..um...so that would be 1997? Sadly moustaches are no longer trendy, and imply other overtones that certainly are not applicable to me, not even in the 1950's sense of gayness. It has been ridiculed to death, by comparing me to "Super Mario" or "Ned Flanders" out of the Simpsons. Not one person has said I look like Tom Selleck out of Magnum PI, but that is probably because I don't.

I think it is a sign of dedication to my art, that in the last 3 years I have grown mutton chops (2008 Oliver as "Mr. Bumble"), shaved my head completely (2009 "Copacabana" as Sam Silva), and grown an enormous beard which nearly took over the world (2010 "Oklahoma" as Andrew Carnes). My wife is thoroughly sick of facial hair, or the lack of it. I suppose next year I will have to grow an extra leg (cue for song).

So what should you do then to show an interest? Well my advice would be to book a ticket before they all sell out. No point waiting until the last minute then finding that there is only room for a small one at the end of a row. Get on th' t'internet now and ger it booked. You never know. If you don't, the plant might come round and eat you! Dah...shouldn't have said that.......Oh and the booking line (when Sue comes back from holiday) is 07875 149943

Are the rioters thugs, or a true political voice?

It is odd that whenever something really bad happens, the media always react to the culprit in a neo-primitive, quasi religious sort of a way. When Brady and Hindly became the Moors Murderers many years ago, they were demonised as "beasts". Peter Sutcliffe aka "Jack the Ripper", was similarly treated. It seems to be an instinctive reaction of the press to a senseless evil crime, to demonise in an almost religious way, the person to blame. In this way we can detach ourselves from what has happened, and put it "out there" away from the sort of lives that we lead.

In just the same way the youth rioters have been isolated, and put in a different category to the rest of us, so that we can alienate them. They are "mindless thugs" who are different from us. "We could not do that sort of thing." I heard one interviewee say, that it is likely, that one of the reasons they have gone out to commit motiveless mindless vandalism, is because, as a group of gang members, they have already been alienated, and isolated from society. Because they are so isolated, it is easier for them to do something so wrong, because they are away from the norms and mores of the rest of society. Ironically, by treating them as scanalously criminalistic thugs, we isolate them even further, which makes it more likely that they will go onto commit similar offences in the future.


What creates such a mindset? It is said that, in London alone there are several hundred gangs already. When the riots took place, they all called a truce, and all worked together in a co-ordinated way with the ultimate goal of riotting. The other gangs in different parts of the country then engaged in copy cat type behaviour.

So that is the gangs. What of the other non-gang members, who apparently came from decent backgrounds, and were in full time employment. One of the rioters was a primary school teacher, another a pensioner of 60. Well, what we don't know is what sort of backgrounds they have experienced in the past. Victims of abuse, whom I deal with daily, have a very chaotic and disorganised type of existence. They have low self esteem and resent any sort of authority. Indeed they find it hard to understand why anyone can be kind to them and give them anything valuable, for the simple reason that they regard themselves as undeserving of affection and love.They constantly fight authority. The first person they trusted in childhood abused that trust, and abused them. For this reason they never accept authority, particularly when they feel out of control.


So how deeply politicial were the riots? Were they really the product of the alienation of the youth of the inner cities, or the pure wanton vandalism of youngsters engaging in speculative acquisitive behaviour, arising out of the cynical greed of kids who have nothing.

I believe the riots were a pressure valve. It is likely that beneath the surface of the psyche of the individual rioters lies much anger and resentment, whether that be against their parents, former abuser, teacher, police, or life in general. They live in subcultures where the role model to look up to is the wealthy drug baron, who has a fancy car, and lots of bling. This is what he wants, so what a good idea it would be to go into the city where looting is taking place. He is told through his mobile phone that one can find plasma TV's, and designer clothes free of charge. All one has to do is walk into shops and help yourself. 

It is rather like normal middle class people receiving a text saying they are handing out £50 notes in Marks and Spencer in the city centre. You will have to go now, because they might run out. How many people would go for it? Obviously riotting is another thing altogether, but I am not sure that they saw it in this way.


Now, every media channel is doing their best to explain away the riots as the youth's way of protesting against government cuts, something illustrating a deep malaise in the discipline of our young people, parents are not allowed to use corporal punishment, children can sue parents etc etc. It is even being suggested, supported by Ian Duncan Smith, I just saw on Channel 4, that people who riot should lose benefit or even their council houses as a way of punishment. How knee jerk and reactionary is that? If you take away all forms of support from an angry alienated person, what is going to happen? He is not going to take the punishment like a man, turn round his life and deeply analyse his motivation. No, he is going to go out and commit more crime in order to survive, eat, and find somewhere to sleep. What a stupid idea, that at least 100,000 people signed up to, apparently, on the Number 10 Downing Street opinion poll.


I think that the riots are a product of the way in which young people have become empowered to exercise their rights over the last 10 years. Without doubt, the events which took place are a product, also, of the power of social networks, and Blackberry Messenger. Undoubtedly there will be many who have inner anger generated by abuse in childhood, in the same way as others are angry about racial abuse, and alienation from the police. Many will have been grossly influenced by their peers, and the social influence of gangs. I really don't think many of them will have been motivated by thoughts of the way in which David Cameron is decimating the Legal Aid system, and removing the right to free legal advice, or even cutbacks in school building programs, or the funding of child support groups. Many are simply taking advantage of an opportunity for a free lunch. We are all generated by greed. This is what drives the consumerist, capitalist society we all live in. We are all sinners, but some sin, without thought of the consequences, more than others.

Was the Norwegian Child Killer an abuse victim?

I was deeply troubled by the story about the killing of youth socialists in Norway by Anders Behring Breivik. I found it very hard to believe, that anyone could think, that the slaughter of young people was necessary - "a necessary act... a war against the rule by Muslims".The idea was misconceived, and did not make much sense. I began to give the point some thought.

This individual will inevitably be treated by the media as a very bad person. Usually, when something so awful happens, the culprit is tagged with pseudo religious names like "devil monster", or "demon", "beast", or the like, at least in England if you read the News of the World, or the Sun. It is somehow easier for us to accept that someone, who is inhuman, could commit such a crime. They become different from the rest of us humans, who, of course, could not do anything remotely similar. The criminal almost becomes a savage weerwolf, who is only fit to be chained up, stoned, then burned alive. We seem to behave almost like primitive beings. We, thankfully, stop a little short of witch burning.

The psychiatric theories I know of, do not include "bestial disorder" as one of the recognised conditions that can be treated at Broadmoor. Although electric shock treatment, when I last looked, is still used in certain situations, it is somewhat shocking that we still use it in the National Health Service. The media will want to demonise the Norwegian killer so as to appease the understandable anger felt by the public.

In mental health terms, no killer is ever diagnosed at just "bad". The mind is a complex web of different influences, memories, thoughts, and complicated processes. It just does not fit into the mold of a two dimensional disease that has existed from birth. The debate of nature against nurture has waged for many years to and fro. We are currently in a more nature orientated phase, but moving back towards nurture. The point is that when beasts commit serious crimes, they are usually labelled by both the forensic psychiatrists, and the media as guilty of an unnatural condition rather than the product of their upbringing.

If one looks at sex offenders, over 95% of them are the victims of some type of abuse in childhood. A very low percentage of the victims of abuse, however, go on to become sex offenders. Most of the serial killers over history have had a very disturbed childhood. After all, our personality is usually formed before the age of 3. Whilst the rest of life obviously has an influence, and modifies our behaviour, our inate personality does not change very much. So if something really bad happens in those first few years, then it is bound to have an influence on us for the rest of our lives.

So back to the story - Breivik is reported by his lawyer to be "insane". This is because he believes he has started a war which will go on for the next 60 years against democracy, has attempted to destroy the headquarters of the Norwegian government, and slaughtered around 80 young people partaking in a Youth camp on Utoeya island. He is said to be on the far right of the far right, and to want to exterminate the Muslims. For what reason is not clear. His thoughts are apparently over involved, and misconstrued. It is a lot easier for us to label this man insane, and claim that he is acting alone, than to link him with existing far right organisations, of which there are several.

If we can distinguish him from ourselves, then we can remain smugly different from him, in a distant, not understanding, sort of a way. The media will help us in this route by not reporting much about his past, I wager. In the same way as John Venables was demonised for killing poor Jamie Bolger in an unprovoked sort of a way, so will Breivik be labelled as a devil. There was a sexual element to the Bolger killing that we never got to hear about. I will say no more than that.

What is a better explanation for his behaviour? All the psychiatrists I have spoken to have said that in the vast majority of the mental health conditions they have treated, child abuse, whether emotional, physical, or sexual, lies somewhere in the background, as an influence on thinking and behaviour.

So is Breivik a victim of abuse in childhood? Well firstly we will probably never be told because if his parents are alive, their confidentiality has to be respected. Secondly, the media will not report the soft option, but rather go for the evil monster alternative to appease our primitive, blood lusting feelings of revenge. True, what he has done is evil beyond description, and upset me when I heard of it, but whether we will ever hear the truth, the whole truth, and all the truth, I very much doubt.

Anglia Regional News | Anglia Tonight - ITV Local

Anglia Regional News Anglia Tonight - ITV Local

Watch Peter's interview on Anglia Tonight regarding the former pupils of the paedophile Derek Slade in the 1970s and 80s who have launched legal action for compensation.