[Tubby Isaacs]

On that thread, Liz is pressed on what she did about Brand's bad (not as I understand it, criminal) behaviour.

"I told a manager who didn't do anything", fair enough, that's maybe what I'd have done. But a bit feeble given the way she projects herself, I reckon.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Ha ha. Maybe it wasn't quite the blockbuster.

[Youngian]

It apparently failed to twig with certain people that a Jewish socialist might not be entirely in sympathy with Alf Garnett, however well he played him.

If you were a viewer not sympathetic to Alf’s views you may still recall the series as crude despite getting what they were doing. Well worth a rewatch as to how smart Speight and Mitchell’s material was, stands up very well.

[Youngian]

And doesn’t work for just any law firm but ‘a combative law firm.’

How Russell Brand tried to silence his critics - using feminist Meghan's favourite lawyer

His chosen attack dog, in this endeavour, was one of the most high-profile defamation specialists of our times: Jenny Afia.

A partner at Schillings, the combative law firm whose clients have ranged from Roman Abramovich and Elton John to the family of Captain Tom Moore, Afia is perhaps best known for her work on behalf the noted feminist Meghan Markle.

She featured as an interviewee in both Prince Harry's recent Netflix documentary and 2021's BBC show The Princes And The Press, in which she told host Amol Rajan that allegations suggesting the Duchess was a 'difficult or demanding boss' were 'just not true' and that the term bullying should in no circumstances be applied to her royal client's behaviour. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/articl ... wyers.html

[Philip Marlow]

Behold the true culprit.

[MisterMuncher]

It's a tenet of the Mail creed that anyone who can or does instruct legal assistance above the level of your mate Johnny who does a bit of conveyancing and probate stuff is definitively guilty of something.

Unless it's them, or Boris.

[Andy McDandy]

Also that anyone who engages with them, rather than shutting up and taking it, has to suffer for their temerity. This includes their legal team, because duh, guilty people don't deserve lawyers and anyway you can see it in their eyes that they dun it.

Part of the general Mailaise - everything is personal, and it's never your fault.

[MisterMuncher]

It's a general attitude that could be mitigated, if not excused, if even once (beyond the Stephen Lawrence grandstanding) they had a story they could stand up and ran it anyway, damn the legal torpedoes. Instead, they're as pathetic as most of the press when it comes to injunctions and the like. When they have legal troubles, it's because of lies, slander and sloppiness, not because they stood up against the bullies.

Cast your mind back to when superinjunctions were briefly the bete noir of the press. The Guardian said "Fuck you, sue me" and published the Trafigura story. The Mail joined the red tops to wail that people on Twitter could freely discuss who Ryan Giggs was fucking and they couldn't use it to sell papers.

[Boiler]

I assume we've seen this: https://www.gov.uk/government/news/medi ... sell-brand

What the absolute fuck has this got to do with HMG? Am I missing something here?

From today's Times:

On Friday night the government made an extraordinary intervention in the workings of Britain’s supposedly free press. In an advisory note to editors, the attorney-general warned about the reporting of the allegations against Russell Brand.

Victoria Prentis KC, both a cabinet minister and the government’s primary legal adviser, wished “to amplify the importance of not publishing any material where there is a risk that it could prejudice any potential criminal investigation or prosecutions”. “Publishing this material,” she added, “could amount to contempt of court.” Anyone with even the sketchiest knowledge of how the media works surely knows that every single word of reporting on Brand has been rigorously scrutinised before publication. And one of the many things looked at is whether there is a contempt issue.

As a journalist for more than 35 years, I have always understood that contempt of court “bites” when proceedings are active (ie there has been a summons, an arrest or a charge). There have been no arrests in this case. No one has been interviewed by detectives. There are no active proceedings that can be prejudiced. The attorney-general is either poorly informed about the law of contempt or has taken it upon herself to issue a thinly veiled threat intended to have a chilling effect on reporting of the Brand allegations.

The work of journalists on The Times, The Sunday Times and Channel 4’s Dispatches brought these allegations (which Brand denies) to light and forced the police to open an inquiry. Is the government telling reporters to stop interviewing women who have courageously come forward, stop pursuing legitimate and important public interest journalism? Meanwhile, Brand is free to pontificate on social media channels.

Prentis’s intervention is a shocking overreach. It is not her job to tell reporters to stop reporting on issues where there is merely the “potential” for criminal proceedings. It is the job of reporters to uncover misconduct and wrongdoing, to gather evidence that could lead to criminal trials. What will she do next? Curtail all reporting of crime and criminal justice? Or is she only concerned with cases involving celebrities?

The freedom to report on crime and policing is under sustained attack. The relentless advance of judge-made privacy law makes it legally perilous to identify suspects who are under investigation or arrest. The Law Commission is proposing to ban reporters from the trials of alleged sex offenders. Secret arrests? Secret trials? And now a government threat to curb investigative journalism.

The attorney-general’s censorious warning has no basis in law. She should withdraw it immediately.

[Andy McDandy]

Considering the government made no such statements when Prince Andrew or Kevin Spacey were under similar scrutiny (and the reporting was similar in tone), I'd suggest this is Prentis getting bored on a Friday afternoon and looking for something to do.

Also, considering that there's apparently a strike by firearms officers in London over the indignity of being subject to investigation and charges if they kill someone, with the Home Sec weighing in and promising that she'll stop any proceedings in the case of a repeat De Menezes, all against the backdrop of serious and systematic corruption in police forces across the country (but especially the Met) I'd say this is all a bit rich. So rich that the Tories are tapping it up as a potential donor.

[Youngian]

Media select committee chair Caroline Dineage has made some remarks about the Brand affair and Prentis’s advice sounds legally correct. Braverman hasn’t got the memo though as she’s been busy today gobbing off about trigger happy cops facing murder charges.

[Tubby Isaacs]

[Boiler]

I can hear a high-pitched noise coming from my computer....


...oh, that'll be the conspiraloons.

[Tubby Isaacs]

Mr Freedom speaks.

[satnav]

Apparently he has been grifting his followers for money in the last couple of days. Surely he has got more than enough money in the bank to cover his current cash flow problems.

[Crabcakes]

Apparently he has been grifting his followers for money in the last couple of days. Surely he has got more than enough money in the bank to cover his current cash flow problems.

Got to have enough to pay hefty bribes and when you disappear off to some corrupt backwater to lie low.

[Youngian]

Apparently he has been grifting his followers for money in the last couple of days. Surely he has got more than enough money in the bank to cover his current cash flow problems.

Now he’s touting for Roubles.

[MisterMuncher]

Half hour out from the BBC's similarly unspecified Panorama program hitting the air and no coherent consensus on what, or who that's going to be about.

[satnav]

Apparently it is how the CEO of Abercrombie and Fitch used and abused young male models.

The BBC has confirmed Abercrombie & Fitch ex-CEO Mike Jeffries and his partner Matthew Smith are the subject of a Panorama special.

[Spoonman]

Russell Brand: Woman accuses comedian of sexual assault on film set

Russell Brand has been accused of sexually assaulting an extra on a film set in a civil lawsuit filed in the US.

During filming for the rom-com Arthur in July 2010 the comedian is alleged to have exposed himself to the anonymous woman before following her into a bathroom and sexually assaulting her.

Brand is facing accusations of rape, sexual assaults and emotional abuse after reports in the British media.

He denies the allegations and says his relationships were "always consensual".

Brand has yet to respond to the lawsuit.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-67318813