Oh, no - shirley no' the McKie case again !!!!

Today's Scotland on Sunday makes for interesting reading. It reports that Cathy Jamieson declines to publish the 'John McLeod Report' (a report prepared for the executive by an 'independent fingerprint expert'). She advances as her reason that "Publication would undermine the basic principle of Scots Law that neither party to litigation is obliged to disclose reports commissioned for the purposes of the litigation". Poor Cathy - she's obviously being fed this horseshit by a first year trainee in the Scottish Executive. "...neither party is obliged to disclose..." means that they cannot be compelled to disclose - it DOES NOT mean that they are prohibited from disclosing. It is a basic principle of Scots Law that neither party to a marriage is obliged to disclose communings between each other during the subsistence of the marriage......but I can reveal that last night I said to my wife "I thoroughly enjoyed that lovely meal, darling". There, I was not obliged to tell you that, but I wasn't prohibited from telling you either. It's dead easy, Cathy. More sinisterly, what Cathy is actually, but unwittingly, referring to is the well-known legal principle that if, during litigation, you discover something to your opponents advantage or to your own disadvantage then you are not obliged to tell your opponent - the only exception to this rule is in Criminal proceedings where it has traditionally been the case that the prosecution are bound to tell the defence of anything which assists the defence case or undermines the prosecution case. So for example, say hypothetically that the Executive were involved in litigation, and during the course of that litigation the Executive commissioned a report from an independent expert, and that expert concluded that the Executive's case was total bollocks - then the Executive could conceal that report from their opponent and proceed as if it didn't exist. Legally sound. Morally and ethically repugnant. Very particularly untenable when it is the STATE against the individual, because then it becomes almost exactly like criminal proceedings, where a much higher standard of disclosure is expected from one side. But it is this repugnant legal position of non-disclosure behind which Cathy now shelters. Scotland on Sunday quotes Jack McConnell on his appointment as First Minister in 2003, "I guarantee to be open and transparent in government.....". I don't want to make any comment about that because it would involve the use of emotive language like 'lying' 'deceitful' 'hypocrite' etc and I don't want to use such violent language. But, when Jack describes the McKie affair as an 'honest mistake' and arrogantly waves away demands for an inquiry from all of the opposition parties, from an ex-Lord Chancellor, from an ex-Senator of the College of Justice, from a spokesman for the Faculty of Advocates, from editors of all the significant newspapers, from countless correspondents to these newspapers, and from every person of reasonable intellect who has given the matter any thought, is he being 'open and transparent in government'?