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Just Law: The changing face of justice – and why it matters to us all

Serialised in The Times in the week before publication

Helena Kennedy's new book, published on 4 March 2004, describes in shocking detail the current retreat from the rule of law and civil liberties, both of which are being subverted for short-term gains. The book is a powerful reminder that the rule of law – from Guantanamo Bay to the corridors of Whitehall – is fundamental to a world in which democracy, peace and justice can flourish.

Roundly challenging the record of modern governments with regard to fundamental democratic rights, Kennedy insists that we return to the values of equality and fairness and a respect for human dignity. She argues that, in the last 20 years, we have seen a steady erosion of civil liberties, culminating today in extraordinary legislation that wholly undermines long-established freedoms.

Are these moves a crude political response to demands for law and order? Or is the relationship between citizens and the state being reframed and redefined?

This thought-provoking study covers issues such as:

• the right to privacy and the increase in electronic surveillance
• the questions raised by advances in genetics
• the procedural issues of 'double jeopardy'
• the proposed reduction of trial by jury.

Kennedy also examines the huge increase in the number of women in prison and the inequities of the welfare system. In addition, she probes into issues that involve our relationship with other states – asylum, immigration, terrorism – daring to ask: is the climate of fear being deliberately used by the government to roll back our liberties?

Just Law is published on 4 March 2004, price £20.00. It can be purchased from all good bookshops and from Amazon.

	Press enquiries for both of Helena Kennedy's books – contact: Patrick Hargadon Publicity director Chatto & Windus/Secker & Warburg 20 Vauxhall Bridge Road London SW1V 2SA Tel: 020 7840 8540 Fax: 020 7932 0077 Email: phargadon@randomhouse.co.uk

Eve Was Framed: Women and British justice

Helena Kennedy's remarkable book casts a cool and superbly informed eye on the law's inadequacies. The essence of her case is that justice is compromised because, too often, the people who are caught up in an already flawed legal process are judged on grounds that have nothing to do with the facts of their cases. Those most susceptible to this injustice are women, the young, the working class, immigrants, the Irish, black people and homosexuals.

This is a cogently argued examination of how the British legal system ignores, downgrades, underrates and discriminates against women … Kennedy has properly argued that a profession that practises law and pursues justice must be seen to be just, reasonable, unprejudiced and open to public scrutiny. Bravissimo!
Julia Neuberger, Sunday Times

A powerful and authoritative polemic … Kennedy cites precedents and incontrovertible evidence to show how a 'web of prejudice, privilege and misinformation affects women' in all their dealings with the law … brave, forceful and eloquent. It may even change things.
Jessica Mann, Sunday Telegraph

Eve Was Framed is published by Vintage, price £8.99. It can be purchased from all good bookshops and from Amazon.

Other books contributed to by Helena Kennedy

All the following books are out of print, but may be available from libraries or second-hand bookshops.

• Balancing Acts: On being a mother, edited by Katherine Gieve (Virago, 1989).
  Chapter on the complicated issue of holding down a career while attempting to be a 'good enough' parent.
  
  
• Child Sexual Abuse within the Family, edited by Ruth Porter (Tavistock Publications, 1984).
  Chapter on the inadequacies of the legal system in dealing with child sexual abuse.
  
  
• The Bar on Trial, edited by R Hazell (Quartet Books, 1978).
  A first look at discrimination against women at the Bar.

Reports

• Learning Works (1997): report of the committee on widening participation in further education, Further Education Funding Council. This seminal work changed government policy on further education.
  
  
• Banged Up, Beaten Up, Cutting Up (1995): report of the commission of inquiry into violence in penal institutions for young people, Howard League for Penal Reform.
  
  
• Secrecy vs Safety (1994): report for Reading Borough Council following an inquiry into the health, environmental and safety aspects of the Atomic Weapons Establishment, Aldermaston. This recommended that there should be 'a full public enquiry into the health, environmental and safety aspects of AWE Aldermaston' and that this enquiry was 'well overdue'.

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