Bit of a low blow?
Andrew, its a bit unfair to imply that my only expertise is in housing law. Its a feature of being a barrister that you often don't get to chose your area of practice early on. So I ended up spending most of my time reading, drafting and arguing about leases? So what?
Rather more recently I've been doing a lot of internet law, with you know, actual clients (such as ISPs) who pay me to advise them about just this kind of thing and who are worried about some of the implications of the Act. So I am not an interested amateur, this is what I do.
Rather more misleading is the suggestion that I "led" ORG's legal case on the Bill as it went through Parliament. Far from it. The Bill contained some truly dreadful nonsense which I blogged about on two occasions. On both those occasions the elements I complained about were removed from the Bill. I don't take credit for that, but I can hardly be blamed for not having an effect.
But as for the way the campaign went? I was happy to comment on any legal queries that came my way (from ORG but also from many others) but I doubt I had any real influence over the strategy either ORG, the music industry or anyone else for that matter deployed in fighting over the Bill. More's the pit.
Campaigning is exhausting and I'm happy there are other people to do it for me.
The Act is still pretty dreadful, just from a pure lawyerly point of view. You do not get well drafted legislation by rushing through things on the wash up. I suspect it will waste a lot of people's time and money and absorb a lot of energy and effort. We shall see.
Next time: why not get in touch with me before writing about me? My door is always open - well my electronic door is always open - and I am always happy to discuss law with anyone really interested in it. Just having a dig at someone's professional competence without really checking your facts is plain mean.