Jenrick hammers Hermer

Jenrick explodes the cab rank rule.

Robert Jenrick MP takes on the Attorney General Lord Hermer KC in this video, examining the cab rank rule that barristers must obey. Jenrick is right when he says there is no way Lord Hermer KC had to take on any of the questionable clients that he did. Hermer did so, because he wanted to.

It’s a great watch. But I was on to Lord Hermer KC and the army of human rights lawyers he leads months ago.

First, the basics. The Attorney General gives legal advice to the government on whether a government proposal is lawful or not. He acts for the government and is head of all the other government lawyers. I explain the role of government lawyers here.

Lord Hermer KC is a left wing human rights lawyer. Before he became AG, Hermer only ever sued the government, employed by people who claimed they were wronged by the British state. Previous clients included Gerry Adams. Lord Hermer KC was “paid £30,000 to represent Gerry Adams against IRA bomb victims in a High Court case that is due to go to trial next year.”

Lord Hermer KC intervened for Liberty in Begum v Home Secretary, arguing that Shamima Begum should have been allowed to return to the United Kingdom. Wikipedia tells us Lord Hermer KC represented the mother of one of the "ISIS Beatles". He represented former Guantánamo Bay detainee Abu Zubaydah in Zubaydah's Supreme Court case against the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO). He was also involved in multiple cases related to the war on terror, including representing victims in the Afghan unlawful killings inquiry, and the inquest into Corporal Stephen Allbutt's death in the Iraq War. (I had to rely on Wikipedia as his CV has been removed from Matrix Chambers website.)

Now before you say Lord Hermer KC is some kind of extremist, he is not. This is all bread and butter stuff for the left wing human rights lawyer. In fact bread and butter is unfair – these are the prestige cases, as Jenrick rightly explains in the video. Dominic Grieve and his hysterical reaction on Twitter is completely wrong. It is unfair and misleading to claim that Jenrick’s is “comments are a direct attack on our principles of justice and our freedoms.”

The left wing human rights lawyers fight over who gets to represent Gerry Adams against the victims of IRA bombings. They will put down their vegan sandwich and crawl over one another to intervene for Liberty and argue that Shamima Begum should be brought back to the UK. They love suing the British army for wrongdoings committed by the British army.

This is all standard operating procedure for your human rights lawyer. They will get up at 5am in the morning to sue the British State over whatever wrong-doing the State is alleged to have committed.

I listened to this Matrix podcast from the 18th of October 2022. “Richard Hermer KC, Helen Mountfield KC and Professor Caroline Elkins explore how the rule of law can be used as a weapon in the British colonial project and how it might be utilised to seek redress and accountability.” (Emphasis added.)

My take-away from the podcast was as follows. Lord Hermer KC believes the British empire was a bad thing, it was racist, it used systemic violence to enforce control on the natives, and as such the British state and government are responsible for ongoing harms experienced by former colonies today.

Photo by British Library on Unsplash

Therefore, Hermer obviously believes the British state is morally and legally responsible for this systemic colonial violence of the past and therefore can be sued for compensation today. Hence the use of the phrase whether the rule of law ‘might be utilised to seek redress and accountability.’ This is lawyer speak for litigation.

In other words Lord Hermer KC believes compensation should be paid by the British State (which will come from British taxpayers) and paid to former colonies today. (I’m sitting in Ireland typing this so I’m getting my wallet out.)

Lord Hermer KC has already admitted he recused himself from giving advice to the government in certain cases, due to conflicts of interests.

Given Lord Hermer KC’s list of previous clients he has represented against the British State, I’d wager there is a fair amount of ‘recusing’ going on there over at the Attorney General’s office. Which makes me think, just why are they paying him for this? I also think it unusual that the lawyer who only ever sued the British state is now Attorney General.

Lord Hermer KC will still be a great lawyer, don’t get me wrong. He knows his way around the HRA, the ECHR and the ICC. In the old days it was standard for barristers to both prosecute and defend in serious criminal trials, although it is less common now. It is a point of pride for a lawyer to argue things both ways, depending on who is paying.

I’m just here to give you the facts. And the fact is, Lord Hermer KC has a long list of former clients he used to represent when suing the British state. Now he is Attorney General giving advice to the government on cases that include people suing the British State.

Whether Lord Hermer KC was really the best choice Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer KC could have made for Attorney General I leave for the reader to decide.