Smart regulators know that traditional command and control interventions, however tempting to politicians, are not always an effective or efficient form of response; they know that the criminal law tends to do better at defining crime into existence rather than defining it out; they know that private law remedies are of limited impact; and they know that public law control exercised by agency licensing or negotiation is open to the twin charges of being too soft or being too tough. Even smarter regulators know that they can sometimes achieve the desired regulatory effect by relying vicariously on non-governmental pressure (whether in the form of self-regulation or co-regulation by or with business or the professions, pressure exerted by consumers, the activities of pressure groups, and so on) or by relying on market mechanisms; in addition, they know that careful consideration needs to be given to selecting the optimal mix of various regulatory instruments.

Drawing on studies in governmentality, this paper considers the ways in which the selection and allocation of households for social housing have been conceptualised and treated as problematic. The paper urgues that the notion of ‘need’ emerged relatively slowly over the course of the twentieth century as the organising criterion of social housing. Yet ‘need’ became established as a powerful tool used to place those seeking social housing in hierarchies, and around which considerable expertise developed. While the principle of allocation on the basis of need has come to occupy a hegemonic position, it has operated it continual tension with competing criteria based on notions of suitability. As a consequence, this paper identifies risk management as a recurrent theme of housing management practices. By the 1960s need-based allocation was proving problematic in terms of who was being prioritised; it was also unuble to resist the challenge ofdeviant behaviour by tenunts and the apparent unpopularity of the social rented sector. We argue that the tramition to advanced liberalism prefaced a shift to new forms of letting accommodation bused on household choice, which have been portrayed as addressing core problems with the bureaucratically-driven system. We conclude by reflecting on the tensions inherent in seeking to foster choice, while continuing to adhere to the notion of need.

This article examines the treatment of pure economic loss claims in England and Canada. The two jurisdictions have much in common. Starting from the same case sources, the common law of each system has struggled to deal with claims for negligently-incurred pure economic loss. Yet, the systems diverged in the 1990s when the Canadian Supreme Court refused to follow the lead of Murphy v Brentwood DC and reiterated its adherence to the Anns two-stage test. It is submitted that, in view of recent developments which suggest the gradual convergence of the two systems, English law should carefully examine the categorisation approach adopted by the Canadian courts. The current English position is far from clear, and the Canadian model is capable of bringing transparency and greater clarity to this difficult area of law.

The general theme of this lecture was prompted by Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the second woman in the United States Supreme Court. To celebrate my appointment she sent me a fascinating book, Supreme Court Decisions and the Rights of Women. This set me thinking about what a similar book on House of Lords Decisions and the Rights of Women might have to say. My first thought was ‘not a lot, surely’. The two courts are very different. The Supreme Court is a constitutional court under a constitution which guarantees the equal protection of the laws. The appellate committee of the House of Lords is not a constitutional court, although the Human Rights Act 1998 has made it look a little more like one. The judicial committee of the Privy Council, however, has in practice the same composition as the House of Lords.

This article examines Stapleton's view that insurance has lacked influence and been no more than a ‘makeweight’ argument in the development of tort liability. Looking at the wider context, the article describes the overwhelming importance of insurers to the litigation system and argues that all cases are affected by insurance practice. It distinguishes the effect of insurance upon judicial fact finding, on the one hand, and the development of common law rules, on the other. It examines the ability of insurers to influence legislation relevant to the tort system. It concludes that, if account is taken of all these areas, insurance has been of vital importance to the law of tort. Without it, the system of personal injury compensation would not have survived. This conclusion is reached even though insurance is largely ignored by the great majority of tort texts.

Many human and financial resources are being spent on the asylum determination and appeal processes in order to distinguish those asylum applicants who require protection from those who do not. However, the majority of failed asylum seekers do not leave the country. The lack of an effective removal policy defeats the purpose of having an asylum system at all. In other words, removals of failed asylum seekers are essential to preserve the integrity and credibility of the asylum system. Since forced removals are a crucial component of our asylum system, this paper seeks to examine how they can be made more eflcient and humane. In particular, it examines the recent measures adopted through the Asylum and Immigration (Treatment of Claimants, etc.) Act 2004 and proposed measures currently debated at the EU level.

This article takes a critical look at common law constitutionalism, a theory which has received much support in public law circles of late. The first part of the article elaborates the common law constitutionalist position. The second part of the article assesses the cogency of the theory in terms of its ability to accommodate certain paradigmatic features of judicial review. The article concludes with the suggestion that public lawyers, in their forays into theory, might do better to look to the special role that judicial review plays in assessing the legitimacy of governmental action rather than its supposed connection with ‘fundamental principles of morality’.