Public Lectures from the Faculty of Law, University of Cambridge

On Tuesday 24 November 2015, Lord (Tony) Grabiner QC delivered the 2015 Cambridge Private Law Centre Allen & Overy Annual Law Lecture entitled "Public Policy, Illegality and Contracts".

The event was kindly sponsored by Allen & Overy.

More information about this lecture is available from the Private Law Centre website at www.privatelaw.law.cam.ac.uk/events/past-events

This video discusses six issues arising out of the recent statement of Prime Minister David Cameron to the House of Commons entitled "Prime Minister’s Response to the Foreign Affairs Select Committee on the Extension of Offensive British Military Operations to Syria".

Dr Veronika Fikfak and Dr Hayley J Hooper discuss the questionable international legality of military action, the strategic use of parliament and its potential impact upon the emerging Consultation Convention, and the responsibility of MPs to hold government to account across a broad range of relevant domestic issues. Thereafter they analyse the impact of the way government shares intelligence information with the House of Commons, especially in light of the 2003 Iraq conflict, highlighting several relevant but under-discussed rules. Finally, they discuss the role of party political discipline on armed conflict votes.

Dr Fikfak researches in the fields of public law, human rights and international law. She is particularly interested in the interface between domestic and international law and is currently writing a monograph on the role of national judges in relation to international law. Dr Hooper is currently a Fellow at Homerton College, and her doctoral research at Balliol College, University of Oxford concerned the use of "closed" or "secret" evidence in the context of judicial review of counterterrorism powers, and its extension to civil procedure more broadly.

Drs Fikfak and Hooper are currently co-authoring a monograph on parliament's involvement in war powers entitled Parliament's Secret War (forthcoming with Hart Bloomsbury, 2016).

For more information about Dr Fikfak, please refer to her profile, and about Dr Hooper to her profile.

Law in Focus is a series of short videos featuring academics from the University of Cambridge Faculty of Law, addressing legal issues in current affairs and the news. These issues are examples of the many which challenge researchers and students studying undergraduate and postgraduate law at the Faculty.

This entry provides an audio source for iTunes U.

In his speech at Chatham House on 10 November 2015 (https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/prime-ministers-speech-on-europe), the Prime Minister David Cameron outlined those aspects of the EU he would like to see reformed prior to any referendum on the UK's continued membership of the EU. EU employment law - one of the most controversial areas of EU policy - was not expressly identified in his list. In this video, Catherine Barnard considers the impact of EU social poicy on the lives of UK employees and what effect 'Brexit' might have on employees' rights.

For more information about Professor Barnard, please refer to her profile at http://www.law.cam.ac.uk/people/academic/cs-barnard/9

Law in Focus is a collection of short videos featuring academics from the University of Cambridge Faculty of Law, addressing legal issues in current affairs and the news. These issues are examples of the many which challenge researchers and students studying undergraduate and postgraduate law at the Faculty.

This entry provides an audio source for iTunes U.

Judge Dean Spielmann, President of the European Court of Human Rights, gave a talk entitled "The contribution of the Court to a culture of human rights in Europe" on 12 November 2015 as a guest of the Centre for Public Law (CPL).

For more information, see the CPL website at: http://www.cpl.law.cam.ac.uk