Well, today was the first of my law lectures, as is to be expected, the influx of students ebbed and flowed until the class had arrived, making for a less than definite starting point to the lecture, Chris made the importance of reading newspapers very clear (although, whether this was a side-note or part of the lecture is still unclear. Not that it matters, I just need to scrape some money together for papers.). We started off discussing liable, the hideously abused system of punishing people on the fine points of what they say, which was brought into perspective through Chris' own tales of liable, which, as enthralling as they were I fear may be too much to divulge to any old body on the internet (these things are delicate matters). This among with 40 other major statutes that restrict journalists really emphasised the need for legal knowledge in this profession.

The lesson then moved into more general ideas about journalism, and the idea of the constitutional laws of country, which encompass the Human Rights Act; specifically Section 8 and the right to privacy, made relevant by the need for journalists to acquire consent regarding certain types of cases. This law then competes in legal standing with Section 10: the right to free speech (a right liberally applied by journalists).

Through the discussion on the laws themselves, the lesson inevitably drew towards the topic of the 3 estates (the 3 estates being the Legislatory, Executive and Justiciary powers that run the country), which I will come to later due to the tangent that was brought about by this:

The idea that Plato identified with 'who guards the guards' (if I've misquoted him it's okay, he's dead) brings to mind another idea; that there is a 4th estate, that monitors these powers... the press! Keeping track and exposing potential corruption (along with what they may also do in their private life), and thus giving those in the profession an enlarged sense of importance in the national scheme of things, which is nice.

Back to the main themes now, and the Judiciary estate: being previously of AS Law, I was mostly just refreshing there points, but my memory being as it is, this was very useful. The two types of legal proceedings are Civil and Criminal. The Civil Court deals with non-violent crime, or most forms of it (theft being an ideal example of an exemption from the rule). This Civil Court deals with liable, such as defamation etc, which is mostly not newsworthy, (unless you are a follower of Katie Price, who seems to change her underwear less frequently than her husband) however, it is usually the home to charges brought upon journalists who make the mistake of accusing someone of something in the wrong words.

The Criminal Court, however, is a far more likely field to find a journalist (at work) as Chris assured us that it was criminal journalism in which there was a shortage, and thus a potential for jobs. Winchester Crown Court is apparently second only to the Old Bailey, for it's sizable criminal cases and so presents itself as a unique opportunity (one which I must endeavour to follow up on).

The way in which journalists must then report upon criminal law, due to the complex nature of liable laws and such like, is delicate, and must be treated with utmost care. One of the main features of which, is the way that we might write about a suspect, in that, the person must be convicted as a murderer before they can so be called in a journalistic report (the example given was that, technically, Hitler was not a murderer, although, he's dead, so I can call him what I like. The slimy little genocidal toad.). It is also important to have specific definition of the crime, due to a thief being well within their rights to sue a journalist calling him a burglar (as ridiculous as that sounds). With this in mind, we can however pass opinion upon a person without too much thought, so if my opinion was that the thief is an idiot, then that is absolutely fine. Which is nice to know.

Other than this we learnt about an 'evidence gap' and the differing standards of proof, which, is interesting but I have already rambled on and it's time to go back and learn some more, so I'll have to just leave it at that... For now!