Where can you look up English Law?

dandy-candy

There are lots of things in life we know are against the law - but where can you see it actually written for us to read? It seems odd that we are expected to just always take someone's word for it! I can't believe it is only solicitors etc who have access to it because if the everyone has to abide by the laws then surely they should be somewhere everyone can access them or else how can you know what you shouldn't be doing??

fthl

Law generally comes from two places - statute and common law. Some statute law is then clarified by case law.

Some statute law is available free, for example see the legislation.gov website. The caveat is that it doesn't have every statute and isn't wonderfully up to date.

Some case law is also free - see the bailii site. Again, not everything is here.

Everything else is written down, but in dedicated law reports (the books you tend to see in lawyers offices on the tele) or in commentary texts, like halisbury's. These are books that combine case law and statute with a bit of editorial comment.

then you have the paid for resources - westlaw, lexis etc. Online databases. Cost hundreds to access.

That is the very high level view - it gets more complex from here...

shaun_from_Africa

One thing to remember is that simply seeing the law as it is written may not actually be of much use in a lot of cases.
It is often very confusingly worded and could easily be misunderstood, especially by a non law trained person.

Hintza

And then of course depending on where you are you also have simpler (supposedly) Scots Law which is more closely related to Roman Law.

Hintza

shaun_from_Africa wrote: »

It is often very confusingly worded and could easily be misunderstood, especially by a non law trained person.

In my view the word "often" should be changed to "in most cases".

The sooner this is changed the better.

dmg24

shaun_from_Africa wrote: »

One thing to remember is that simply seeing the law as it is written may not actually be of much use in a lot of cases.
It is often very confusingly worded and could easily be misunderstood, especially by a non law trained person.

A few years ago after a breakdown I lost many of my cognitive skills, at times could barely string together a sentence and had trouble reading the most basic texts. However, the one thing I never lost the ability to do was read court reports! I still have problems with articulating myself when even vaguely tired, but can take a report to bed with me and follow it with ease. No medic has been able to explain to me why this is the case!

Hermia

You can find a lot of laws on http://www.legislation.gov.uk/, but I find reading them makes my brain melt!

Hintza

dmg24 wrote: »

at times could barely string together a sentence and had trouble reading the most basic texts.

You sure this is not just getting older? I have found since starting to work for myself (on my own) my attention, writing, reading and debating skills are not as good as they once were.

Freddie_Snowbits

English Law stops here mate
http://www.echr.coe.int/echr/homepage_EN