Learn from the mistakes of others

Andrew Bartlett's recent post in his blog concerning recent changes to the Aviation Transport Safety Regulations prompted me to comment thus:

The ‘reasonable person’ has just become even more unreasonable.

Our legal system has developed the term ‘reasonable person’ as a term of art over some hundreds of years. It’s not easy to find a clear definition, but it used to be pretty obvious what it meant after you read a couple of quotes.

As a lawyer, I’ll be expected to explain how this law makes any sense to people who have been dragged into court by it. The ease with which these kinds of changes to our laws can be made is more terrifying than the supposed threat they address.

‘Ignorance is no excuse’ is now a very unreasonable part of our ever more terrified body of laws. Laws we’re supposed to not only make ourselves aware of, but take seriously.

Go read his post.