ianssmart

 On 31st October, after practising the law for 46 years, I fully retired. I had various plans for my time but in truth, so far, have realise...

Since just about everybody else involved at the time of the independence referendum has had their say, I suppose I had better have mine.  Th...

 And so it is over.  I hesitated to say anything much about the election, not least because I was out of the Country for much of it, visitin...

 In the Summer of the year 2000, Maureen, my wife, and I went on holiday to central Italy. We stayed just outside the hilltop village of Pac...

 I have just finished two well read blogs about the Hate Crime Act concluding that it doesn't, in truth, materially change the law at al...

 Yesterday morning, I finished my blog under the shortened title in the last two words above. And to my astonishment, a civilised discussion...

When I was younger I was a massive admirer of the French Novelist Emile Zola. A great socialist and social reformer, he wrote a series of bo...