Being driven back from Grange Park Opera a few years ago I noticed that our car was heading towards Basingstoke and London but that we were in the dual carriageway lane reserved for cars going to Winchester and points south. Although I was in an advanced state of drunkenness I was the only one to notice this anomaly.
Disaster was averted and Nicholas Mostyn, hearing the story later, commented “Christopher Bellew drunk talks a lot more sense than most people sober”. We also share a Goddaughter.
I have been sailing with James Holman a few times and also on some good walks with him on the Isle of Wight. So I hope you feel that if I am biased on personal grounds at least I am equally biased towards both eminent judges.
If you have not read about it, Judge Holman says that divorce (laughably called Family) cases should be made public. Judge Mostyn says that low profile cases are not publicised and that the same consideration should be granted to high profile cases.
My parents divorced in the 1970s. Their case was heard in the High Court in The Strand over three days and there was short-lived but significant publicity in all the tabloids and broadsheets. This was unwelcome but it was also unsatisfactory that the case had not been settled out of court. The whole event was a worry and a trauma for my mother but the publicity was only a small part of that.
If you are in the public eye (incidentally neither of my parents were) it is reasonable to expect all aspects of your life to come under public scrutiny. It is not reasonable to crave media coverage when it suits and to shun it when disagreeable things happen. Furthermore, muzzling the press over a divorce case could be the thin end of the wedge, as Uncle Matthew was so fond of saying in The Pursuit of Love. Nancy Mitford’s title seems appropriate in this context.
Verdict: Holman wins by a Knockout.
Christopher: I am behind in reading your blog so only just now read the story about Grange Park. Indeed, entirely true that you spared us a very sorry end on the motorway. For which, thank you. However, the person who made the very astute comment about you was another equally respected member of the legal profession, Charlie Miskin. Although it is entirely possible Nicholas Mostyn thinks the same.
M’learned friend is correct – I mixed m’judges.
Very much enjoying your blogs here in SW Turkey and pleased that a comment has been posted after a long silence. Well done, Sarah!
The remark from whichever legal M-s–n it was rang a bell.
In 1976 Lord George-Brown was pictured in all the newspapers sprawled in a gutter outside, I think, his club.
The Times leader the following day intoned: “The fact remains that George Brown drunk is a better man than the Prime Minister (Harold Wilson) sober”.
I personally wouldn’t have thought there was a great deal to choose between them.
I am told, by your brother-in-law, that George Brown was invited to dinner at the Savile Club with a view to being made a member. His behaviour was so atrocious that even that splendidly broad-minded establishment ejected him onto the pavement before the evening was over. His repeated attempts to crawl up the steps and gain re-admittance were rebuffed, offering ample opportunity to the Press to photograph him in his cups.
Your comments are most welcome and leaven my duller posts.