This year we’ve embarked on a particularly comprehensive revision of our casebooks. We’ve thoroughly revised our GDL casebook, for example, the first time dates have been added to all cases and we’re sure that the additional context will help you. We’re also excited to let you know that there are going to be seven new casebooks for each of the seven core foundation subjects. These are at the final production phase and should be ready from this Autumn term.
The review process means that we’ve looked up and re-read well over 2,000 cases and of course some stick in our minds. We weren’t going to forget Carlill or Donoghue v Stevenson anyway, but here’s one that we hadn’t remembered but which made us smile.
Who can recall R v Bouchereau? This just amused us, perhaps because of all the hype around the EU right now. In this case, way back in 1978, a man was accused of a couple of minor drugs offences. The court made a referral to the ECJ to ask if those offences were sufficient to justify deportation. The English court was told workers can only be excluded under Article 45(3) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union where they are a “genuine, present and serious threat”.
Since that didn’t seem to be appropriate the court fined Mr Bouchereau £35 instead. We’ve looked up the inflation rate and that fine would cost about £190 today. There still seems to be an overwhelming discrepancy between the threat of deportation as against a fine of less than £200!
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