According to the German Government the procedure is not considered to be a punishment but a form of treatment as it provides “suffering tied to an abnormal sex drive…to be cured or at least alleviated”.

In one of its reports the CPT highlighted that although the practice was rare it gave rise to concerns. “Notwithstanding this, the CPT must express its fundamental objections to the use of surgical castration as a means of treatment of sexual offenders.

“Surgical castration is a mutilating, irreversible intervention and cannot be considered as a medical necessity in the context of the treatment of sexual offenders. In the CPT’s view, surgical castration of detained sexual offenders could easily be considered as amounting to degrading treatment.”

The German Government agreed to look into the issue but defended its position and insisted that the procedure helped where “illnesses connected to an abnormal sex drive must be treated, or in order to counter the risk of future unlawful offences being committed by sexual offenders and/or violent offenders, and to thus assist the person affected in managing his life in the future.

“As far as the federal government is aware, there are quite a number of scientific studies on the criminological long-term effects of surgical castration.”

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British courts may be picking up on a trend that has already started in other parts of the world. Indeed, courts in Australia and New Zealand are known for using social networking sites to serve claims.

In the commercial law dispute Mr Justice Teare approved the request to use Facebook after the exact whereabouts of a one of the parties could not be ascertained.

Lawyer Jenni Jenkins, from the firm Memery Crystal, represents one of the parties to the case and said that using sites such as Facebook to serve claims was a predictable evolution. “It’s a fairly natural progression. A High Court judge has already ruled that an injunction can be served via Twitter, so it’s a hop, skip and a jump away from that to allow claims to be served via Facebook.”

Jenkins said that the judge had granted the use of Facebook after being assured that the account in question was active. “The counsel told the judge that someone…had been monitoring the account and they’d seen that he’s recently added two new friends, which made the judge chuckle.”

Additional time has been given in order for the concerned party to respond to the claim in case the account is not checked regularly.

Courts are increasingly using modern technology. For example, the Crown Prosecution Service is looking to increase the use of computers in trials so that cumbersome court bundles will no longer be needed. Claims are traditionally served in hard copy but other methods have been resorted to on previous instances. For example, in December last year a judge used sms to file an injunction against the Occupy movement in London.

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Legal representatives for the website argued that the site did not itself host any material and, as such, it worked in a similar way to the search engine Google. However, the judge did not agree. “In my judgment, the operators of The Pirate Bay do authorise its users’ infringing acts of copying and communication to the public. They go far beyond merely enabling or assisting.”

In June the high court is expected to rule whether internet service providers, such as BT, should prevent their users from using the site. The claimants, consisting of several music groups, are urging internet service providers to prevent their customers from accessing the site.

In the summer of 2010, the founders of the Pirate Bay were found guilty of allowing the site’s users to infringe copyright and a Swedish court ordered them to pay a fine.

The British Phonographic Industry welcomed the judgment. Its Chief Executive, Geoff Taylor, said, “The high court today ruled that The Pirate Bay is illegal. The site defrauds musicians and causes huge damage to the music industry and wider creative industries.

“The ruling helps clarify the law on website blocking and we will now proceed with our application to have the site blocked to protect the UK’s creative industries from further harm.”

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Rahmatuallah has yet to be put on trial and respond to any charges. Despite the writ of habeas corpus Rahmatullah has not been released and the US authorities have made clear that they have no intention of transferring the prisoner to Britain. This week the Court of Appeal accepted submissions by lawyers acting for the Government saying that the US refuses to release the prisoner from their custody.

Rahmatullah’s lawyers, supported by the human rights organisation Reprieve, have now lodged a complaint with the Scotland Yard, alleging that the UK Government is guilty of war crimes by not securing his release.

The Executive Director of Reprieve, Clare Algar, said that Britain had “sadly squandered an opportunity to right the wrongs of the past. But this is far from over. The British Government’s failure to persuade its supposedly closest ally to honour agreements signed between the two countries has left it open to war crimes charges.

“The Government now faces yet another investigation over its involvement in torture and rendition. British ministers clearly made no great effort to secure the release of Rahmatullah. But it has to be asked how anyone can claim the existence of a ‘special relationship’ when the US does not even seem prepared to raise a finger to prevent Britain from facing war crimes charges.”

As the US is notoriously famous for keeping prisoners for long periods of time extraterritorially, it remains to be seen whether Rahmatullah will be put on trial. Human rights groups are concerned that that the UK is trying to hide its involvement in torture and illegal renditions, especially as the Government is also pushing for expanding the use of  closed material proceedings.

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The cases were troubling as the children had been deemed to be underaged by social services, but when they arrived at a Home Office screening unit officers ignored the social services’ assessment and were adamant that the youngsters could not be classified as children.

A boy from east Africa, 17 at the time, said that during his asylum screening interview, “A woman walked in, looked at me briefly and then said: ‘He’s not 17.’ I explained that social services had assessed me as a child and were looking after me but they didn’t listen to what I said and told me they were going to put me in detention. I was very distressed and begged them not to put me in prison. I tried to refuse to leave by sitting on the floor. But they put me in handcuffs with my hands behind my back, which was very painful.

“Nobody explained to me why I was being detained. One officer said I couldn’t be detained because I was only 17 but the others ignored it.”

He spoke of his time in detention as one that had left him with painful memories. “I hated being in detention. The security guards treat you like you’re nothing. Every morning they would wake us up by shouting: ‘Get up, get up, get up.’ One of them said to me: ‘This is not your country, you shouldn’t be here.’ Six years after being released from detention I still have nightmares about being locked up. Some mornings when I wake up I think I’m still in detention. The worst time was the nights. I cried myself to sleep every night that I was locked up.”

Wrongfully assessing a child’s age can have detrimental consequences and result in the child suffering traumatic experiences in adult-detention centres. It is hoped that relevant staff will be made more aware of the need to safeguard asylum-seeking children.

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According to an internal Ministry of Justice email seen by the Guardian, “We have decided that Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunal Service must take urgent action to mitigate the number of hearings that are failing as a result of the contractor’s difficulties with sourcing interpreters at short notice…

“We understand that some staff and judiciary have sympathy with existing interpreters. We must however do all we can to encourage sign-up to the new arrangements – the new contract has the potential to bring significant benefits to both interpreters and the justice system as a whole.”

Last week the Shadow Justice Secretary, Sadiq Khan, wrote to the Justice Minister, Kenneth Clarke, expressing that there was wide concern over the Government’s decision to give all interpreting work to one firm. “Ensuring value for money in delivery of translation and interpretation services is clearly important, but this must not be to the detriment of the quality of the service in such a critical area of justice.”

Similarly, the Justice Spokesman for Labour, Andy Slaughter, said that the lack of interpreters could amount to a violation of the 1998 Human Rights Act. “There is a genuine risk of miscarriages of justice because of inadequate or unsuitable interpreting and translating service, and breaches of the right to a fair hearing under the Human Rights Act”.

The Ministry of Justice said that although the scheme needed to be improved it should stay in place. “The Ministry of Justice is working with Applied Language Solutions to closely monitor the operation of the new contract.

“The Government is determined to ensure that taxpayers get value for money across the whole of the justice system. This new contract will save at least £18m a year on the cost of interpretation and translation, a reduction of almost a third, but will ensure that high quality interpreters and translators are still available to those in need.”

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The Chief Inspector of Prisons, Nick Hardwick, was concerned over the increase and stressed that staff should only resort to using force where there is an immediate risk and not simply because of an inmate’s failure to follow staff instructions.

According to the Inspectors, “In five out of the six preceding months, failure to obey staff instructions was frequently recorded as the issue leading to the use of force. Managers assured us that this analysis was not a true reflection of the main reason for the use of force and that in most instances it had actually been used to prevent escalations of altercations between young people.”

The Inspectors were also critical to the fact that the institution strip-searched all new arrivals, despite there being few discoveries of illegal items or substances. Frances Crook, of the Howard League for Penal Reform, said strip-searches should not be performed unnecessarily.

“Important safety issues have not been met and there were many incidents of strip-searching children unnecessarily.”

Harwick highlighted that young offender institutions are often full to maximum capacity these days and, as such, it is crucial that all safeguards all complied with. “It is of some concern that some important recommendations in relation to safety have not been met and young people report feeling less safe and less well supported.

“Following the contraction in the number of establishments for children and young people under 18, it is likely that the current situation, operating at or near full capacity, will continue. The need to ensure safeguarding and behaviour management procedures are operating well will be of greater importance than ever.”

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The proposed expansion comes after the Government has struggled with its public image as British personnel’s complicity in torture of terrorist suspects has been made public.

Senior figures in the security sphere support the proposal as they consider it necessary to keep some information classified in order to maintain good relationships with foreign intelligence agencies. Sir Malcolm Rifkind, Chairman of the Parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee, has stressed that if sensitive intelligence material is made public in UK courts then this will have a damaging effect on the UK’s relationship with other countries.

“It is essential that our courts are able to handle intelligence material, and that that material is properly protected. It is a fundamental principle of intelligence-sharing that such exchanges are kept confidential.

“Publication of other countries’ intelligence material, whether sensitive or otherwise, undermines the key principle of confidentiality on which relations with foreign intelligence services are based and has the potential to cause serious harm to future intelligence co-operation and thereby undermine the national security of the UK.”

Whilst the security community is generally supportive of the measure, of the few responses made public it is clear that there is wide concern about secret court proceedings.

For instance, the Northamptonshire police force’s submission focused on the harmful consequences of CMP procedures. “It is proposed that CMPs are available whenever the secretary of state makes the decision that the disclosure of sensitive material will be damaging to the public. This is very widely drafted and could result in its misuse. This could be used to encompass material concerning crime prevention tactics, police informants and intelligence led operations.

“The impact of the overuse of CMPs would be to damage the UK reputation of a free and fair democracy.”

John Hemmings, Liberal Democrat MP, said that secret hearings did pose a real danger to a country’s justice system. “There is very clear evidence that secret hearings are unreliable. This is obvious from the many false allegations of blackmail that have been made in recent privacy injunctions…When there is secrecy there is the potential for a disconnect between the judicial proceedings and reality.”

Further submissions will be received and considered before the Government makes a final decision.

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Niall Quinn QC, representing the woman, told the court that his client had been the victim of abuse but that this had not been taken into account when she admitted that her retraction was false. He said she was “undoubtedly the victim of prolonged and serious domestic violence and abuse and multiple rape…[and was suffering] at all material times from a psychiatric disorder”.

As such, he argued that the conviction should be quashed because, “An unjust conviction is an unsafe conviction”.

Quinn said that his client had been diagnosed with suffering from “post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of the rapes and domestic violence inflicted on her”. Her case resulted in the Director of Public Prosecution, Keir Starmer, acknowledging that new guidance was needed for how the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) dealt with rape victims.

Quinn said that his client had been emotionally blackmailed and forced by her husband to perform sexual services on other men, for which he then took profits and went on to blame her for having succumbed to his will.

Alison Lewitt QC, for the Crown, accepted that the woman had been exposed to significant pressure from her husband’s family to withdraw her allegations and that she had been in a vulnerable mental state.

Lewitt said that the CPS would not oppose the woman’s conviction being quashed. “[I]f we were looking at this case today on the facts that we now have, in the light of the policy that we have now developed, it’s unlikely that [the woman] would have been prosecuted”.

However, Lord Judge, the Lord Chief Justice, said that he was concerned that such a result would leave the justice system in “disarray” as, “there are hundreds of cases where there is a [subsequent] change in the law or a change in process”.

However, Lewitt said that the woman’s case was unique as it itself led to a change in the CPS guidelines. Quinn recognised that it was a difficult case but agreed with Lewitt that it was of an exceptional nature. “There is a way out of this uncomfortable position. The Crown are uncomfortable, and no doubt your Lordships are as well. We submit there does not have to be any wider application. This defendant has been tried in a way that has turned out to be unfair”.

Judgment has been reserved until a later date.

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The high number of care applications is having consequences for law firms that are struggling with cuts to legal aid. The Law Gazette reports that solicitor firms often have to let junior staff handle cases of “life and death”.

“Family solicitors believe the child-care crisis is jeopardising access to justice for vulnerable children, while discouraging new generations of practitioners from a career in child law.”

Naomi Angell, Co-Chair of the Law Society’s Family Law Committee, said that the current situation is neither in the best interest of clients nor professionals. “Are junior staff equipped to make difficult decisions where there are alcohol, drug or mental health issues? Can they persuade a mother in an abusive relationship to choose between her partner or her children? Are they trained to make decisions that could mean the difference between life and death? I think not.”

Family law solicitor Barbara Hopkin, of the Association of Lawyers for Children, highlighted that the current system would discourage young people from practising family law. “The rising number of care applications means an unlimited source of work for those firms who can afford to do it. We all took a 10% cut in civil legal aid fees in October 2011, which led to some firms going out of business or just giving up publicly funded work. Those of us who are left are expected to do more work for less money, which is no incentive for future generations of lawyers to work in this area of law. The situation is unsustainable.”

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