British Politics

I think all intelligent people knew where we were going to end up with this utter nonsensical twaddle.

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The book is magnificent (just finished it in three days). But yeah, trannies and immigrants -look at that shiny thing over there. Peasants.

LEADING ARTICLE
The Times view on British law firms’ links to Russia: Oligarchs’ Privilege

The work of City lawyers for wealthy supporters of Vladimir Putin is highly lucrative but morally tainted. That line of business should come to an end
The Times leading article

Monday March 21 2022, 12.01am, The Times

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A high court judge dismissed a libel claim againsst Tom Burgis, a journalist for the Financial Times, over his book, Kleptopia: How Dirty Money is Conquering the World

Defending the rule of law is central to a free society. That is not synonymous, however, with defending the activities of lawyers. Sanctions imposed on Russia because of its brutal aggression against Ukraine have exposed a web of links between extremely wealthy beneficiaries of the Putin regime and Britain’s legal profession.

The lawyers who act for Russian oligarchs in attempting to protect their wealth and reputations are not disinterestedly pursuing justice. They are enriching themselves and their firms by defending the powerful against scrutiny. The Law Society, which represents solicitors in England and Wales, has a moral obligation to investigate this scandal.

The controversy has been given impetus by the government’s announcement of sanctions against seven Russian business figures. These include Roman Abramovich, owner of Chelsea Football Club, and Oleg Deripaska, whose mansion in Belgrave Square in London was briefly occupied by protesters last week. The government maintains that these billionaires are closely associated with the Putin regime.

Bob Seely, a Conservative MP, named in parliament four English lawyers from prominent firms who he said were working with “Putin’s henchmen”. And two British journalists, Catherine Belton and Tom Burgis, told the Foreign Affairs Select Committee last week that legal firms in London were working to intimidate investigators into dropping stories about Russian oligarchs, who can afford the vast expense of prolonged legal action. Burgis named the firms of Carter-Ruck, Schillings, Mishcon de Reya and Taylor Wessing as among the culprits. He even claimed he had been put under surveillance.

Stephanie Boyce, president of the Law Society, has responded that “it’s the job of solicitors to represent their clients, whoever they may be, so that the courts act fairly”. But this is not in dispute. The problem is rather secrecy that goes well beyond the normal bounds of client confidentiality, and the techniques used on behalf of Russian oligarchs to tie down and exhaust defendants in legal cases.

All ten of the leading UK law firms, ranked by turnover, maintained offices in Moscow until sanctions were imposed. One of them, Norton Rose Fulbright, initially banned staff from talking publicly about the Ukraine crisis. It then muddied the issue further with a statement that it was fully complying with its legal and regulatory obligations, which no one had disputed in the first place.

Public concern focuses rather on the ability of leading firms to help Russian clients circumvent scrutiny by using legal manoeuvres to impose prohibitive costs on journalists and other inquirers. When Belton and her publisher HarperCollins produced a book dissecting the opaque western investments of President Putin’s supporters, they were met with immediate lawsuits by Abramovich and other Russian billionaires. The first port of call for these tycoons is a letter to the author, newspaper or publishing house from a prominent London law firm. It takes courage not to back down against such threats, but to continue to shine a light on the workings of power and influence of a rogue regime and its beneficiaries.

It is not hard to see why these law firms have invested in Moscow operations and represent Russian clients. Though they are reluctant to provide information, it is clear that cultivating this jurisdiction has provided them with millions of pounds in fees over the past two decades.

It is time this ended. The principle that everyone deserves legal representation does not mean the servants of a brutal autocracy are entitled to the services of a particular law firm. The link between British lawyers and the Putin regime’s supporters is much too close. The Law Society should investigate its own members, and the firms involved should sever this line of business without delay.

 

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe: "I went to a land of savages but I didnt care about the risks. I was imprisoned by the savages for six years but I blame the government who got me out not the savages who imprisoned me."
This is the upside down world of crazed lefties.

 

The usual moaning from crazed Lefties and Remoaners. They hate electoral systems that keep them out of power or when they lose because they are complacent. It is much better to have systems like Italy where they can have coalitions that fall out every couple of years causing another election. Or how about that EU system where the Parliament is just a talking shop and all the laws are decided by a bunch of unelected losers on the Brussels Politburo.

Any system that keeps crazed Lefties out of power is obviously disapproved of by crazed Lefties. Some of those crazed Lefties even have cervices but only identify as crazed Lefties.

 

So ****ing true.