On Wed, 23 Jul 2008 13:41:24 +0100, "The Todal"
wrote:


"Peter Lynch" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 23 Jul 2008 12:19:00 +0100, The Todal wrote:

"Peter Lynch" wrote in message
...
We all know that ignorance of the law is no defence. So it
would seem reasonable that people should have, at least, a
passing familiarity with it.
Given that this country's been passing laws for 900+ years
does anyone have a view on how long it would take to actually
read them all?
As an easier option, how far back to most of the laws that
people generally get into trouble with, go? I'd guess maybe 20-30
years. So as a "lightweight" option, how many laws would
we be talking about - and how long to skim through that lot?

You presumably mean the criminal laws, that is the laws that impose
criminal
sanctions. If you included other laws it would be quite impossible for
anyone to read all the laws, just as it would be impossible to read the
entire Oxford English Dictionary.

A good criminal law textbook would take no longer to read than "War And
Peace" and would give you sufficient basics to enable you to avoid
committing the most serious offences such as murder or rape or GBH. You
could then at leisure read up on all the various road traffic and
environmental offences. I suppose it will depend on whether you want to
know
about all the criminal offences that anyone could possibly commit, or
merely
those that are relevant to the way you live and work, as a specific
individual.

Yes, thanks for the insight. The point I'm sneaking up on, is whether
it's "reasonable" for the average person to have an awareness, or
knowledge
of all the laws that they could fall foul of (or commit, depending on
if it's possible to break the law by accident). Given the volume of
material
involved. Just as relevant, can or should a constable have this knowledge.

While a "good criminal law textbook" may have the length you describe,
would it be accessible in terms of language and technical terms, to the
general public?

"Police Law" by English and Card, available from Amazon, contains all the
law the average police officer needs to know, and is written in a way that a
police officer with the educational standards to be expected of such a
person, would easily understand.

"Criminal Law" by Card, Cross and Jones is geared more towards the law
student but anyone who has been educated to A level standard would have no
difficulty reading it.

You can find them on Amazon.

Butterworths Police Law is pretty good and very understandable. The
only problem is one that I suspect most other references have this
past decade. That of having to glue in pages of notes as the
government alters the law on what has seemed at times a daily basis