Aug 2009 26

A Betamax Moment0

Keystone Cop capers over at the DCMS of late. We read that the 1984 Video Recordings Act is incompatible with European Law, and therefore void. Traders are apparently being encouraged to voluntarily continue with the spirit of the legislation while the mess is being sorted out.

Yet the department has also claimed that past convictions reached under the provisions of the act were lawful. This raises an interesting dilemma.

Either the law was valid, or it was invalid.

If it was invalid, as the Government admits, then there was no legal basis for convictions. We can expect a number of expensive law suits, which (under the European Court of Human Rights) we know from many previous test cases HMG would lose.

But if the convictions were themselves properly authorised, as the Government also claims, then it means admitting to the supremacy of Parliament over legislation emanating from Brussels.

That would be quite a legacy from the likes of Gordon Brown. After all, Eurosceptic MPs and Peers have been trying to pass legislation expressly to that effect for donkeys years. Truly, a marvellous pickle for the lawyers and spin doctors in the months to come.

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