The Gazette 1993

GAZETTE

MWH DECEMBER 1993

jurisdictions are to be welcomed. It was open to the judges in both cases to decide each case in another manner. The judges in the Garvan case and the judge in the Tower Hamlets London Borough Council case were both motivated by a sense of justice and

A lawyer on business to a city in Holland recently went into a coffee shop to ask for coffee. He noted that I somehow or other the coffee shop did | not resemble a coffee shop in Ireland j in terms of the clientele. The Dutch I Justice Minister has confirmed the laywer's worst suspicions. The Minister continued by stating that if the number of coffee shops were i reduced and the managers of the I remaining sections were asked at least to refrain from selling "soft" drugs to a wider clientele than their regular, manageable group of customers, who should moreover be of age, a stop would be put to the current trend, whereby the original objectives were being increasingly departed from. He noted that drugs tourism would also be checked as a result. A lawyer on business to a city in Holland recently went in to a coffee shop to ask for coffee. He noted that somehow or other the coffee shop did not resemble a coffee shop in Ireland in terms of the clientele. The Dutch Justice Minister has confirmed the lawyer's worst suspicions. •

The Judge noted that the key to the proper approach to the manner in which interviews of applicants for social welfare benefits should be conducted was encapsulated in the single word "sympathetically". That word denoted a sense of fellow-feeling. The judge noted that the key to the proper approach to the manner in which interviews of applicants for permanent accommodation as homeless persons should be conducted was encapsulated in the single word "sympathetically". That word denoted a sense of fellow- feeling. Cross-examination, hostile questioning, adverse comment or indication of a likely adverse decision were all inappropriate postures. The local authority should give the applicant ample opportunity to have present someone able to assist or advise him or her, according to the judge. Finally, he noted that in the instant case the alchemy of a particular interviewer, a particular interpreter and a mode of questioning that did little, if anything, to favour the applicant had supplied the recipe of unfairness.

both avoided an ultra-legalistic approach to the matter at issue.

Coffee Shops

This piece is thinly disguised as a brief to readers who are interested in developments in other States of the European Union. The Dutch Justice Minister, Ernst Hirsch Ballin, has recently stated that he wishes to clamp down on the sale of "soft" drugs to foreigners in coffee shops. During the debate on his 1994 budget, the Minister told the Lower House of Parliament that more and more coffee enterprises have been set up in a number of cities which have shown no social responsibility whatever in dealing with their customers. He noted that this applied in particular to the large influx of foreign customers. He agreed with the Christian Democratic Party that this trend has to be stopped.

These two decisions in the two

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