Was John Major right about Scottish devolution?

In the 1992 general election, John Major who was Prime Minister at the time warned that Scottish devolution would lead to the break up of the UK. Recent opinion polls seem to bear him out.

But as Magnus Linklater points out, it may just be a passing fad.

Sharia Courts and legal pluralism

There's an interesting article by Clive Coleman in the Saturday Times about Sharia courts and the effect that they're having on Britain's legal system.

He mentions the fact that unlike our Batei Din, Sharia courts are extending into criminal matters. He sees this as no cause for alarm:

We allow organisations such as schools to administer their own justice. Schools often deal with an assault by one pupil upon another, clearly a criminal act, without involving the police. We are largely content to let them do so, perhaps because they are tacitly licensed in that behaviour by the State.

But there's a big difference between common assault and a serious crime such as rape or drug dealing. An unofficial Somali court recently heard the case of a group of youths accused of stabbing a fellow Somali. Witnesses and families were brought together for a hearing in which the men admitted their guilt and their fathers and uncles agreed compensation for the victim.

Critics of Sharia courts like to argue that they will lead to beheadings and amputations. It goes a lot further than that. If a stabbing can be excused by a simple matter of compensation, what's to say that a Sharia court won't let a murderer off with blood money?

British Christians and the sex equality law

I may not be Christian, but I feel sympathetic towards Christians fighting the new sex equality law. The public don't seem particularly keen on the new laws either, but this is Britain, and the Government aren't troubled by anything so trivial as public opinion (you wonder why people don't bother voting).

I wonder.... in whose best interests is the law is really concerned with? Earlier this year in the state of Massachusetts, the Catholic Church withdrew from adoption services rather than be forced by the state to place children with gay couples. Are children's needs coming first or are we more concerned about punishing people whose views we dissapprove of?