Thread by @Raphael_Hogarth

How the government must and should change the law as a result of the PM's announcement:

(1) Most trivially, the PM said "we will increase the fines" those who break the rule. If he means the fixed penalty notices that police officers can mete out, these amounts are set in Reg 10 of the lockdown regulations. That will need changing.
legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2020/350/…

(2) The PM said "you can sit in the sun in your local park, you can drive to other destinations, you can even play sports but only with members of your own household." Does that require a change in the law?

The law (reg 6) says you can't leave home w/o reasonable excuse, and gives examples of excuses. Sitting in the sun etc are not listed as examples, but "reasonable excuse" is an open category, so the fact the PM has told you it's fine should make it a reasonable (ie lawful) excuse

This new guidance does not, therefore, *strictly require* a change in the law, but the police and magistrates will inevitably get it wrong unless the law is changed, and fine/prosecute/convict innocent people. The government has two options, in my view, on how to change the law.

First, it could add to the list of automatically reasonable excuses in reg 6.

Second, it could revoke reg 6. The government has a *legal duty* to revoke as soon as gvt considers the reg unnecessary, so should at least think about it.

The question is: what conduct is this reg now prohibiting that (a) we want to prohibit, and (b) is not already prohibited by another law? Gatherings of >2 are prohibited under a separate regulation (reg 7), so the "stay home" rule (reg 6) isn't doing that work.

Reg 6 prevents gatherings of 2 people from different households *at home* unless for a listed reason; maybe we want to keep preventing that. It may also prohibit going to work for a business that is meant to be closed; maybe we want that too. If not, there's a case to revoke.

(3) Does the rule on gatherings itself need to change? Nothing the PM said is inconsistent with the current rule. When Raab said you can see both parents at once in a park, that was inconsistent with the rule, but he seemed to backtrack afterwards.

So the main things that need to change are (a) the fixed penalty notices, and (b) either amend or revoke regulation
6 (which prohibits going out w/o reasonable excuse).

[/ends, but may add to this as other things occur to me.]