Perfidious Albion

Are threats and intimidation against legal counsel the norm for British ministers?

Is the UK seeking to disrupt and discredit Hong Kong's independent judicial system? It certainly looks like it. How else do you explain the actions of the UK foreign secretary Dominic Raab and others, who mounted a disgraceful and unwarranted attack on Barrister David Perry QC?

Perry was to prosecute several people here under colonial-era laws. Following the cab-rank system operated by the UK and Hong Kong Bar, Perry agreed to undertake the job. This process aims at ensuring judicial independence.

However, he was immediately threatened and vilified by misinformed people, who sought to conflate this assignment with the national security law. Raab then jumps in to accuse Perry of being a 'mercenary' in a scandalous twisting of the facts. Are threats and intimidation against legal counsel the norm for British ministers? 

It is no wonder that a recent survey by a Washington-based group found the UK's freedom levels substantially lower than Hong Kong's, despite our democratic deficit. Measuring human freedom across multiple dimensions, Hong Kong came third, while the UK dropped seven places to seventeenth place. Ouch!

The nine defendants, including the high-profile Jimmy Lai and Martin Lee, will appear in District Court on February 16. They stand charged with organising an unauthorised assembly and participating in the said unauthorised assembly. The charges stem from the Public Order Ordinance; a colonial-era law left behind by the British. Following Raab's line of thinking, it's acceptable for the colonial Brits to charge people with this offence, but not the post-1997 SAR government. 

Perry has previously acted in Hong Kong to prosecute former Chief Executive Donald Tsang and milkshake murderer, Nancy Kissel. 

Many in our legal fraternity expressed shock at Raab's ill-informed intervention. They see it as imperative for the Hong Kong judiciary's future to have both overseas judges and practitioners, admitted for both the prosecution and the defence. (See the letter below to The Times). Thus, if the UK is seeking to shore up Hong Kong's judiciary's independence to ward off Beijing's influence, then it's pulling in the wrong direction. 

This latest episode appears to be part of a concerted campaign. Last summer, overseas judges in Hong Kong faced pressure to step aside to appease the UK's naysayers. In response, Beverley McLachlin, the former Chief Justice of Canada, who'd served in Hong Kong, responded with "it's a wonderful court". 

Anyway, a new prosecutor is appointed. So the case will go ahead against the defendants, who will enjoy all the rights conferred through a common law legal system. 

​Fiat justitia!