Anurag Deb

In an exhilarating change to the usual experience of clinical negligence review lists in the High Court, the Master ordered wasted costs against 5 ppl for not turning up, struck out a claim for delay in serving replies to particulars and strongly suggested that more ppl should sue their solicitors 😬

Before the UKSC judgment in Dillon (+ the value of the Windsor Framework), a rundown of EU law issues in that case, how the government wants them dealt with and how Eleni and I think the government is wrong. Also, a link for the launch of our forthcoming report on remedies and the WF (16 Dec).

Which I think makes a broader point about a legislature remaining sovereign while having its statutes disapplied (i.e. the great "paradox" of Westminster sovereignty in relation to EU law). 2/2

I don't think I had a favourite law as such but one statute I like is the Easter Act 1928. It's validly enacted and part of the statute book. But has never had any effect. I like it as an answer to people who insist that a law without legal effect is not law. 1/

I would give up at the point of deciding what criteria to use and instead denounce all law as regulatory violence.

"What's your favourite law?"

As someone who is still here five years later and had this type of chemotherapy for BC, and has looked (through my fingers) at the stats, in a very real sense ET IN ARCADIA EGO - an absolutely wonderful letter about how the human mind makes creative connections

India freedom struggle: The hidden heroines found in long-lost photographs Newly found photos highlight women’s key role in Mahatma Gandhi’s civil disobedience movement against British rule.

This is a lovely discovery. I remember modern Indian history in school: pages and pages of men, maybe one mention of a woman (usually Vijaya Laxmi Pandit). High time for that to be corrected.

BBC News - Forgotten photos reveal women who powered India's freedom struggle
www.bbc.com/news/article...

Death toll passes 1,000 in devastating floods across Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Thailand – latest updates Hundreds remain missing in Indonesia and Sri Lanka as rescue efforts continue after Cyclone Ditwah

"Death toll passes 1,000 in devastating floods across Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and Thailand"

Really horrific

www.theguardian.com/world/live/2...

I once had to use Bengali at a previous job and agonised over the proper translation of words like "airport" for a minute before remembering that, conversationally, we would just use the English word. And that I wasn't a newsreader or a government spokesperson.

Without citing Kenneth Branagh, name a Shakespeare adaptation.

This is the final film in a fantastic trilogy of Shakespeare adaptations.

In my latest article, I explore the (very) limited potential for impeachment to be utilised as an accountability mechanism to address violations of the rule of law in the EU at supranational level.

That's me out of the running.

LinkedIn recommendations for "Top job picks for you": First Legislative Counsel

Somehow, I don't think the NI Executive or the NI Assembly want *me* in charge of drafting legislation (but I would have a *lot* of fun 😊)

Indeed, this is news to the many non-practicing NI academics, or the very few practitioners who also (occasionally) teach. I'm involved in both and am still asked which one I'll end up with, as if I've been speed-dating between the two for 5 years. But of course, we must be on a different planet.

Finally, at 111 pages of double-spaced print, this is a remarkably short document from one of the world's wordiest courts 10/10.

+ interesting stuff about the binding/non-binding nature of the advisory jurisdiction and what an opinion can do to a prior judgment. Tldr: the prior judgment - i.e. the resolution of an inter partes dispute - cannot be affected by an opinion, but the opinion can affect legal Qs in that judgment 9/

Anyway. The main takeaways are that courts can't do something which makes the Governors/President effectively redundant, but can order them to do what the constitution requires of them. In so doing, a collaborative, dialogic federalism must be preferred. 8/

This field of discretion is also not justiciable (only the unreasonable failure to do anything is). This may have implications for how we perceive royal assent powers in the UK, given that the Indian model evolved directly from the UK model (and the Court references colonial frameworks) 7/

Interestingly the opinion makes it clear that the officers do possess a discretion to make that choice (within the limits in the constitution) entirely free of either executive or legislative opinion/advice. Thus, assent (+ etc) is neither a legislative act nor an executive act 6/

Or by necessary implication from that clear text, not otherwise. Thus, courts do not have any jurisdiction to "deem" assent. Instead in limited circumstances (i.e. Governor/President does nothing for ages), the court can grant mandatory relief requiring the officer to choose between their options 5/

This aligns with the spirit of cooperative federalism which the Court took as a highly important constitutional value. The ability of the President or Governors to assent, withhold assent or reserve in relation to Bills can only be circumscribed from the clear text of the constitution 4/

Re Assent, Withholding or Reservation of Bills by the Governor and the President of India 2025 INSC 1333, para 51: "We are of the firm opinion that if two interpretations are possible, then an interpretation that favors a dialogic process, which encourages institutional comity and deliberation between constitutional institutions ... must be preferred over an interpretation that limits or eschews such a dialogue."

Lots of interesting things come out of the advisory opinion (2025 INSC 1333 for comparative law nerds like me) but I think this is among the most important: 3/

Last week, the Supreme Court looked at the issue again, under its advisory jurisdiction. The Indian President had referred 14 questions to the court which arose out of the earlier judgment (critics called it an attempt to appeal the earlier decision) 2/

Earlier this year, the Indian Supreme Court "deemed assent" to 10 long-pending Bills where a particular Governor had done nothing. That judgment was scathing in its criticism of the Governor's conduct but its reasoning - the "deeming" of an act the Constitution doesn't assign it - was criticised. 1/

Appeal allowed in IA: Upper Tribunal was wrong to find breach of Article 8 ECHR

www.judiciary.uk/judgments/ia...

This is the widely reported case about the Gazan family applying for settlement under the Ukrainian Family Scheme. The Court of Appeal makes no criticism of the choice to use that route

"Second, we need to enforce the policy with a vigour that has reduced flows at America’s southern borders by 90 per cent, and in Denmark by 95 per cent. Crucial to the Trump programme is an aggressive policy of removals, including snatching suspected illegals off the street. One friend tells me Latino parents are now so afraid to be seen out and about that the other parents have a rota to walk the Latino children to and from school. It is hard to imagine that taking place in Britain."

Just a jaw-dropping paragraph in Trevor Phillips's column for The Times.

This is a policy that, by his own account, has left parents of a particular race too frightened to walk their children to school.

And that's the example he chooses of the "vigour" we "need".
www.thetimes.com/comment/colu...

🇵🇱⚖️🇪🇺💍🏳️‍🌈I see a lot of "CJEU just legalised same-sex marriage across the EU" or "this is the EU Obergefell v Hodges moment" comments, and that's not quite the case. While the obligation for Poland to recognise same-sex unions concluded abroad is now clear, will the country follow it and adapt its laws?

😭