Ben Cooper QC - Lawyer of the Week (in the Times)

[Justme56]

Sorry I can't share the article, but liked this:

What is the funniest thing that has happened in your job?

As a result of my work in this area, apparently becoming an object of admiration on Mumsnet [the Internet parents' forum] - improbable in many ways.

😁

This really is the most wonderful thing to see in a court judgement - thanks Datun.

I love how hearach15, and may others to be fair, seem utterly convinced that the evil nonbelievers and LGBT communities are completely distinct groups and feel confident in speaking for lesbians and bisexual women even when arguing with lesbians and bisexual women.

feel confident in speaking for lesbians and bisexual women even when arguing with lesbians and bisexual women.

Yes. On a feminist board too no less.

Perhaps they don’t realise how misogynistic it is…. But then in some cases (not necessarily those actively involved on this thread) , I realise they don’t actually care.

That is a lot of money to spend for so little return.

That's what these court cases cost 🤷‍♀️ we're very happy with the return, as was Allison.

@Helleofabore "perhaps they don't realise...perhaps they don't care"

Quite and in the gleeful use of tl:dr and the general just not reading responses it's often fairly clear that the reason they don't realise is that they don't care enough about Women / Lesbians enough to listen and even try to hear enough of what we're saying to make a judgement.

@Hearach15 You asked earlier if we wouldn't have rather AB won against SW and speaking for myself no not really. You are clearly deeply embedded in an adversarial mindset but I don't think we think what you think we think.

Clara window was broken and Clara sued that either Peter or Paul, or Peter and Paul had done it and should pay for the window.

The judge heard the evidence and decided that Clara's window had indeed been broken and Paul was responsible. The judge said that Peter had told Paul to break the window but that hadn't mattered so much because Paul thought Peter was a bit of an idiot and didn't usually listen to him. Also Paul was older and better educated than Peter and even if Peter had told Paul to break the law Paul still should've known better. Therefore Paul should pay for the window.

For people who listened to the trial this seemed a very fair reflection of what the testimony and evidence had told us - and therefore we are happy about it. For people who have been thinking for a while now that Peter's advice isn't so great it's really nice to have a judge agree in the judgement that the advice Peter gave is wrong, and that people should ignore bad advice, we think that too.

Well I personally put in £20 so the massive 22k payout was a spectacular return.
Some women put in a fiver so I'll let you do the math.
Plus from now on we can use the decision in future tribunals.
You keep saying stonewall won, but they didnt bring the case, there was nothing to win.
Plus all the sunlight on just who will be lobbed under the bus by stonewall was worth more than my 20 quid, other womens fiver and the grand total. It would have been worth double or triple the amounts put in. And the humour as it all rolled on was worth more than money.
Support mothers, dogs, wrens and all.

I put in a tenner IIRC, and the hilarity as a result of some of the utter batshittery on show was worth every penny.

Might have to retire this username now though.

Nice analogy, howdoesatoastermaketoast!

howdoesatoastermaketoast

The judge heard the evidence and decided that Clara's window had indeed been broken and Paul was responsible. The judge said that Peter had told Paul to break the window but that hadn't mattered so much because Paul thought Peter was a bit of an idiot and didn't usually listen to him. Also Paul was older and better educated than Peter and even if Peter had told Paul to break the law Paul still should've known better. Therefore Paul should pay for the window.

This is good and maybe is in clear enough language for those who are obviously lacking the understanding to maybe start to understand. But I doubt it.

It will take a few years, but the withdrawal of organisational support will be hard to miss. And most people experienced in business realise that budget cycles take some time to catch up with events. But the very poor quality advice that has been seen to be given (and particularly by an author of a certain book who Hearache is declaring a genius) by Stonewall is being noted quietly in the background by those who are ultimately responsible for the liability of the organisations .... not those who are posting trite phrases and logo changes to suit the 'week' who seem to not understand the ramifications of that poor quality advice. You know, the advice that costs big bucks, and all too often from the tax payers....

I will say again that Stonewall's posts on this court case is either bravado personified or those posting it simply have no strategic awareness at all. And why should they, strategic thinking... fuck.... how boring and mainstream, eh?

I wonder where the recommendation or at least, the initiative, for this course came from....

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11089847/Hate-crime-awareness-courses-SCRAPPED-Hampshire-police-following-controversy.html

I wonder what the £6604 for 2018/19 and the £5690 in 2019/20 that Hampshire Constabulary paid Stonewall actually paid for. I mean they have had a very long history with Stonewall.

www.basingstokegazette.co.uk/news/10193525.force-has-come-top-for-six-years-in-equality-index/

I can only assume that Stonewall was involved somehow in the three forces that rolled out this hate crime course. I look forward to being shown evidence to the contrary. But it seems that their over reach is becoming very apparent to all organisations who were previously (and rightfully at that time) supportive. A lot has changed in the past 5 years.

Yes @Helleofabore, I agree that 'Stonewall's posts on this court case is either bravado personified or those posting it simply have no strategic awareness at all'.

I wonder if these responsible also get paid unreasonable salaries for the quality of output, financed largely by UK taxpayers and corporate rainbow-washing.

Interesting to see how long both of these sources of income will persist.

I would like to see the statistics on what females were brought by Stonewall to the UK please.

Do you have them hearache? I have seen very few references that specify this. I would be horrified to think that female LGBT people , considering how the Taliban treats all females, were not 50% at least of who was rescued. So I will be very keen to see the links to assure me that Stonewall had a balanced approach in this, or at least, a convincing argument as to why it was not evenly split by sex.

Wow!

There have been some posters in the past few days that have had every single one of their posts deleted, seemingly for not posting in the spirit ! This thread is looking a bit holy.

Actually several thread are missing poster's posts today, they seemed to all have followed the same tone that S970's did. Maybe MN is tired of the 'gleeful' posters who have no intention of actually engaging with the topics and are here for other purposes.

"This really is the most wonderful thing to see in a court judgement". It's not the view of the court - it's the view of Allison Bailey.

"evil nonbelievers and LGBT communities are completely distinct groups and feel confident in speaking for lesbians and bisexual women even when arguing with lesbians and bisexual women."

Oh I am aware that a small minority of the LGBT community are GC and I do suspect that the great majority of posters on this thread are straight.

"Have you ever had any discussion with Robin White?"

No but I know she did a better job representing her client on the case than Mr Cooper.

I very much doubt that. She spent 500k and got 20k back. People don't go to court to lose money like that.

As it is she lost on the most important claim (that she had lost income). If she had won that I have no doubt she would have been entitled to a substantial amount of £££.

22k is nothing when you spend 500k. If I place £50 worth of bets and win £2.20 that is a very bad day at the races.

Err. You really don’t read threads do you? Just skim and shoot from the hip.

White was jointly responsible for the bundle… they one that the tribunal judge specifically mentioned in the judgement being poorly handled.

They also never interrogated any witnesses either. They were a junior barrister in these proceedings.

Perhaps you really need to look further than your own gleefully wrong suppositions.

There was a woman featured in the documentary! I suggest you watch it, it is a fascinating insight into the excellent work the charity does for LGBT people.

I very much doubt that. She spent 500k and got 20k back. People don't go to court to lose money like that.

It was entirely crowdfunded, for a principle. Remember them? Court cases are expensive.

White won the case for Stonewall. Maybe if Allison Bailey had hired her instead of Mr Cooper she might have won.

Wishful thinking.

Which female?