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Francis Hoar Profile picture
Francis Hoar
@Francis_Hoar
Barrister, practise in election/public law, commercial and employment law. Legal commentator. History, architecture, skiing, singing.
17 subscribers
Feb 9 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
Not quite. The key problems are the Terms of Reference, the failure to grant core participant status to any group challenging lockdowns and of the chair and counsel to scrutinise the evidence.
Lawyers aren’t purporting to be experts. They just aren’t asking the right questions. And that they aren’t is in large part (although not only) because of the Terms of Reference and the lack of an adversarial process through cross-examination of experts by participants with different perspectives.
Jan 20 • 9 tweets • 2 min read
This is not only reasonable but contemplated by the H. Rts Act, where legsl’n interferes with Conv’n rights in the opinion of domestic cts or Strasbourg. The courts can only make a declaration of incompatibility where the law cannot be constructed compatibly with Conv’n rights. And, while there is a duty to construct legislation compatibly with Convention rights (as considered to apply by domestic courts or Strasbourg jurisprudence) where it is possible to do so, Parliament can then legislate so that it is impossible for the courts to do anything but follow their direction, even if incompatible with the courts’ jurisprudence on Convention rights.
Apr 16, 2024 • 11 tweets • 3 min read
The government’s tobacco Bill is not just stunningly impractical and unjustified by the harm that smoking causes to society, rather than the individual. It is sinister. To require adults to prove their age (not that they have reached adulthood) to buy a legal product is a gross intrusion in to individual privacy and autonomy. It has preposterous results, such as the two 25 year-olds (then 35, 45…), a day apart in age, one of whom will commit a *criminal offence* by buying a product available to the other. (Again, not comparable to an age limit based on an assessment of maturity that is reached, only once, by all.)
Jun 28, 2023 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
I acted in a judicial review of this decsn in 2021. Regardless of whether the court rightly rejected the challenge to the decision of the Sec of State, as a matter of record the JCVI did not recommend vaccination for 11-15s as there was insufficient evidence about their safety. The reason why the Chief Medical Officers of the UK and devolved nations (‘the CMOs’) recommended overruling them was astonishingly flimsy - that they might save a (proportionately) tiny number of school days in absences by reducing the number of children getting Covid.
Jun 13, 2023 • 9 tweets • 3 min read
An improvement on indications of Lady Hallett’s thinking,but it misses central points.
Lockdowns weren’t considered in pandemic plans not just b’cs they were unthinkable but bc’s measures *less* draconian were found to be ineffective & disproportionate.

bbc.co.uk/news/health-65… It *is* positive that the Inquiry is finally addressing the lack of any adequate prior consideration of the exceptional harm that wld be the inevitable consequence of lockdown; let alone to weigh whether that harm was justified by the supposed efficacy of lockdown.
Aug 2, 2022 • 18 tweets • 4 min read
I find the approach of Christian Concern very odd - and wholly divorced from orthodox Augustinian and Aquinan Christian principles, quite apart from Hippocratic ones. Tragic though this case is, it concerns the end of life supporting treatment, not active steps to kill. Not long ago, such withdrawal would have been expected and uncontroversial, however sad, where medical professionals determined that it was very unlikely that a person would awake from a coma.
Jul 29, 2022 • 9 tweets • 2 min read
This is desperately sad news.
Mark was the epitome of a good citizen.He devoted his life to serving his borough. I came to know him during the Tower Hamlets election petition,when his research & analysis were invaluable to exposing the corruption of Lutfur Rahman and his cronies. He had been working on this with other journalists - @TedJeory @mragilligan, John Ware and more - for years. But assembling the evidence was particularly challenging in the face of an organisation controlled by one man.
Apr 14, 2022 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
One of the most interesting moments in the documentary was how quickly the public reaction turned. From ‘how dare you say this’ to ‘he never existed’ (a revealing comment).
The last two yrs have confirmed to me the conclusion one can also draw from this.

theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2… Let’s not beat about the bush. Public opinion is fickle, easily manipulated, and an exceptionally dangerous measure of what is right.
That is why an absolute democracy would be one of the most dangerous - and short lived - systems. A recipe for tyranny.
Feb 8, 2022 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
After 2 yrs in which all protest was banned (3x) for the 1st time in our history, the outrage of politicians, lawyers & journalists is spared for the Leader of the Opposition heckled for not opposing any of it.
Heckling is unpleasant but banning protest is an attack on democracy. Anyone who expresses their shock about a democratic politician being shouted at after having ignored police officers beating up political protesters needs to re-examine their values.
Jan 31, 2022 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Because you and almost the entirety of the media screamed and screamed until we ignored all our pandemic plans and followed a totalitarian state instead. As I said (in relation to pandemic planning) in November 2020.
Jan 14, 2022 • 15 tweets • 3 min read
My questions for Her Majesty's 'Opposition':
1. Did you consider the pandemic plan prepared by Lucy & others & the WHO (explained here: )?
2. Did you ask for analysis of what the Diamond Princess and other examples of transmission showed us about the IFR? 3. Did you question the use of such an incredibly discredited figure as Neil Ferguson and did you investigate his credentials, in particular his history of using his 'reasonable worst case scenario' models to exaggerate mortality by between 1,000 and 500,000 times?
Jan 2, 2022 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Reassurance? Not to sane parents. Certainly not to children.
But yes, very much to your masters in the teaching unions.
Do tell us, will you wear a mask for six hours a day? Humane heads should know that this is guidance. Not only are they not obliged to implement it, they have an independent duty to undertake a risk assessment of the effect of continuous mask wearing on children. Following government advice is no answer or substitute.
Dec 21, 2021 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
This is grotesque.
To make charity to the most vulnerable group in our society dependent on receiving medical treatment is inhuman. I hope - but do not expect - that those who parade their virtue as supporters of the vulnerable condemn it unreservedly. HT @leoniedelt
Dec 20, 2021 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
This is insanity.
Every time we have a winter virus the government decides to track, civil society will be at risk.
Everyone who imposed and encouraged lockdowns must now understand that that precedent can never be undone.
That it has left us forever at the mercy of the state. Article here: thetimes.co.uk/article/rishi-…
Dec 19, 2021 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
Good analysis of Medley’s admission. The problem since last year has been the blinkered focus on only one problem and the failure to appreciate that every policy decision - but particularly legislation controlling people’s lives - can cause foreseen and unforeseen harm. This approach was built in to UK policy making with Raab’s ‘Five Tests’ (in April 2020) that fettered the government’s discretion to remove restrictions until tests relating only to this one virus had been met.
Dec 17, 2021 • 14 tweets • 3 min read
The greatest gift anyone could give would be to burn every last testing kit and to destroy every last laboratory apparatus capable of identifying this virus.

We cannot live like this. Exist, maybe. But not live. The human condition has, since the Neolithic revolution, required an accommodation with viruses. This is not simply a matter of health, it is a matter of our ability to tolerate the risks as well as the benefits of society in its widest sense.
Nov 17, 2021 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Anyone watching it without comment is no friend of human rights. Whatever else they do, however ‘kind’ they like to think themselves, however much they trumpet that they are ‘human rights advocates’, they have been tried. And they have been found wanting. And maybe Germany next.
Nov 10, 2021 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Yes. His calibre relative to today’s tells you that in spades. And that was because of not despite his profession. John Smith may be an extreme example. But my old head of chambers, Sir Ivan Lawrence QC, not only had a regular practice at the Old Bailey, he sat on standing committees (considering legislation), introduced a backbench Bill that became law and held the record for filibustering.
Oct 17, 2021 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Genius? If true he is responsible for more harm than any Englishman in at least 100 years.

thetimes.co.uk/article/7e00f9… Look at the vacant expression on the clown.
Can we never again give any responsibility to wonks with no judgement dressed like 14 year olds.
Oct 12, 2021 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
In the light of the narrative that we didn’t ‘lock down’ early enough, here is a thread from last year in which I provide context. The submissions have been published here: committees.parliament.uk/writtenevidenc….

Casting aside all precedent, advice and proportion was never the right answer. And the Commons report is a pile of arse-covering horse-manure too.
Oct 7, 2021 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
You really cannot stop. Lying and lying and lying again. As you know very well, the insane modelling of your cronies was so inaccurate it was worthy of the epithet ‘Fergusonian’.
Insofar as there is a crisis, it is a crisis of the casualties of lockdown. The victims of your lies. In case you are fortunate enough to be blocked.