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Criminal law, complicity and homicide

Summary of the impact

This research has made a sustained and continuing impact on the development and application of the substantive criminal law, including mens rea and general defences, and especially in the areas of complicity and homicide, in terms of

i) development of the law by the appellate courts;

ii) application of the law by practitioners; and

iii) government policy as to the reform of the law of murder and complicity.

Submitting Institution

University of Central Lancashire

Unit of Assessment

Law

Summary Impact Type

Legal

Research Subject Area(s)

Law and Legal Studies: Law, Other Law and Legal Studies

Empirical and Legal Aspects of Mental Condition Defences and Unfitness to Plead

Summary of the impact

Much has been written about mental condition defences such as insanity and diminished responsibility together with the cognate doctrine of unfitness to plead. However, most of this work has been doctrinal rather than empirical. This case study has developed a sustained and continuing understanding of how certain mental condition defences operate in practice, primarily through empirical analysis. R.D. Mackay's empirical studies of both the insanity defence and unfitness to plead and his studies of diminished responsibility, provocation and infanticide have been used by and have influenced law reform bodies, legislators, policy development and legal analysis.

Submitting Institution

De Montfort University

Unit of Assessment

Law

Summary Impact Type

Legal

Research Subject Area(s)

Law and Legal Studies: Law

The Third Way: Guiding New Policy Over Third-Party Insurance

Summary of the impact

Influential work on insurance law by Professor Rob Merkin led directly to the repeal of the outmoded and increasingly unpopular Third Parties (Rights Against Insurers) Act 1930. With its predecessor criticised for its demands on time and costs, a new Act made it simpler, faster and cheaper for a third-party claimant to recover compensation from an insurer without instituting proceedings against the insured. Merkin not only drew policymakers' attention to the old Act's defects but provided a detailed basis on which to formulate its successor, which earned Royal Assent in 2010.

Submitting Institution

University of Southampton

Unit of Assessment

Law

Summary Impact Type

Legal

Research Subject Area(s)

Law and Legal Studies: Law

Cohabitation, marriage and the law: informing and influencing policy debates on legal reform in a changing society

Summary of the impact

Research undertaken by Barlow at Exeter into cohabitation, marriage and the law has shaped, informed and influenced long-running public and policy debates in Britain over the need to reform aspects of family (property) law, in light of widespread public confusion and on-going societal shifts. The research findings on attitudes to cohabitation and marriage, community of property and pre-nuptial agreements and the law, each cited in public consultation papers and reports advocating reform, have influenced the Law Commission and judiciary in the UK and informed German policymakers. The cohabitation research in particular has-

  • shaped public information and legal advice;
  • informed and stimulated high-profile law reform lobbying campaigns and media debates;
  • strongly influenced Law Commission legislative proposals on cohabitant intestacy, and
  • shaped national policy in use by government to oppose reform in parliamentary debates.

Submitting Institution

University of Exeter

Unit of Assessment

Law

Summary Impact Type

Societal

Research Subject Area(s)

Studies In Human Society: Demography
Law and Legal Studies: Law

Case Study 4: Shaping the development of international environmental law

Summary of the impact

A research programme led by Boyle in Edinburgh (with Birnie (LSE) and Redgwell (UCL)) pioneered the discipline of international environmental law. That work, in turn, informed the infrastructure for international environmental law in practice. Through Boyle's work as legal counsel in several high-profile international cases (2010-11), his proposed subject-paradigm has been translated from theory to legal framework. Crucially, it has been endorsed and applied by both the International Law Commission and relevant international courts, including the International Court of Justice.

Submitting Institution

University of Edinburgh

Unit of Assessment

Law

Summary Impact Type

Legal

Research Subject Area(s)

Studies In Human Society: Policy and Administration
Law and Legal Studies: Law

Legislative change and legal practice

Summary of the impact

Two particular examples of impact on legislative change and legal practice are described: impact on the parliamentary process and impact on mental health practice and procedure. The first example describes contribution to debate during the parliamentary process for the Offensive Behaviour at Football and Threatening Communications (Scotland) Bill and contribution to the decision to reject rushed emergency legislation. The research team's response to the consultation by the Justice 2 Committee was widely referred to by organisational representatives and individuals in the debates. The second example focuses on the impact from a key text, which has been used by both sides and judges in Sheriff Court appeals. The impact here is in its verifiable effect on the practice of law in courts and in the making of legal determinations.

Submitting Institution

Robert Gordon University

Unit of Assessment

Law

Summary Impact Type

Legal

Research Subject Area(s)

Law and Legal Studies: Law, Other Law and Legal Studies

National and international development and reform of the law of criminal evidence

Summary of the impact

Professor Adrian Keane's research relates to the law of criminal evidence, that body of law which regulates the means by which facts can be proved in criminal trials. His publications on the subject have effected change and benefited the awareness, capacity, performance and understanding of the subject on the part of:

(i) the judiciary in the UK and internationally, in reaching decisions at both first instance and at appellate level; and in giving directions to juries on evidential issues that are as clear and consistent as possible

(ii) legal practitioners

(iii) law academics and students (an impact that extends significantly beyond the submitting higher education institution)

(iv) legislators in the People's Republic of China.

The most significant impact stems from participation in a project in Beijing that led directly to a revised Criminal Procedure Law that has improved the quality of the administration of Chinese criminal justice. Specifically, it has rendered criminal trials fairer to the accused and reduced the potential for miscarriages of justice, especially in relation to offences carrying the death penalty.

Submitting Institution

City University, London

Unit of Assessment

Law

Summary Impact Type

Legal

Research Subject Area(s)

Law and Legal Studies: Law, Other Law and Legal Studies

Ensuring that the interests of the UK are considered when courts affect the law of a British Overseas Territory

Summary of the impact

Professor John Finnis has been engaged in a programme of research in legal and constitutional theory. His work on the legal and political responsibilities of UK ministers when acting to affect the law of a British Overseas Territory played a pivotal role in the decision of the House of Lords to reverse the Court of Appeal`s interpretation of the Colonial Laws Validity Act 1865 (CVLA). The Court of Appeal had held that UK ministers could not properly legislate in the interests of the UK as a whole (including its dependent territories), but only in the interests of the particular territory itself. Relying on Finnis`s arguments, the House of Lords changed that precept. Finnis`s work also persuaded members of the House of Lords to express doubts about a central holding of an earlier decision, which concerned the capacity in which ministers acted in legislating in dependent territories. Finnis`s arguments have been relied on in legal argument in later cases, and have been recognised and reaffirmed in subsequent Court of Appeal and Supreme Court judgments. In this way, they have helped to change fundamental constitutional principles affecting not only all citizens in the UK, but also those in its Overseas Territories around the world.

Submitting Institution

University of Oxford

Unit of Assessment

Law

Summary Impact Type

Legal

Research Subject Area(s)

Studies In Human Society: Political Science
Law and Legal Studies: Law
Philosophy and Religious Studies: History and Philosophy of Specific Fields

Privacy, Libel and Freedom of Expression

Summary of the impact

Research conducted by Durham University on the reconciliation of free speech with rights of privacy and reputation has significantly affected contemporary law and policy around the law of privacy, media injunctions and libel reform. Specifically, it has:

(1) resulted in a substantial contribution to the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) Libel Working Group and hence to the Defamation Bill 2012 which followed (now the Defamation Act 2013);

(2) strongly influenced the report of Parliament's Joint Committee on Human Rights on the human rights aspects of that Bill;

(3) influenced a major parliamentary inquiry on privacy;

(4) helped change Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) guidelines on prosecuting the media for privacy-related offences including phone-hacking;

(5) been used in argument by an NGO intervening in two important cases before the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR).

Submitting Institution

University of Durham

Unit of Assessment

Law

Summary Impact Type

Legal

Research Subject Area(s)

Law and Legal Studies: Law
Philosophy and Religious Studies: History and Philosophy of Specific Fields

European Contract Law

Summary of the impact

Beale was a major contributor to research published in 2000 as The Principles of European Contract Law (The Principles). The Principles had and continue to have a major impact on the development of contract law at both the EU and national levels. They formed the basis of subsequent work that led to the Draft Common Frame of Reference (DCFR, 2009), which incorporated The Principles. The Principles and the DCFR have influenced interpretation in the European Court of Justice (ECJ) / Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) and are cited in national courts. They have had a significant impact on reform of national laws and led directly to the European Commission's proposal for a Regulation on a Common European Sales Law (CESL, 2011). With support from the University of Warwick, Beale played a key role not only in producing The Principles but in all the subsequent stages, including being a member of the Expert Group that produced a first draft of the CESL.

Submitting Institution

University of Warwick

Unit of Assessment

Law

Summary Impact Type

Legal

Research Subject Area(s)

Law and Legal Studies: Law

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