http://blog.nearlyfreespeech.net/2012/10/06/official-uk-government-attempt-at-censorship/:
Today, we received a first for us, a letter from the actual UK Treasury Solicitor’s office, the branch of the UK government charged with suing people on behalf of the rest of the UK government. It largely mirrors the private solicitor’s letter, and was much like most other complaints we receive. Much like most other complaints, they demand that we remove the content they don’t like. Much like most other complaints, they offer a bunch of (generally poor) reasons why we should/must do what they want. Like the first solicitor’s letter, they included a copy of the injunction. Like the first solicitor, they have not made any effort that we are aware of to domesticate it with a court that has jurisdiction over us. What’s different about it is this paragraph, toward the end:
“However, should you choose not to assist us in this matter, we reserve the right to seek an enforcement order. This may result in significant costs, which Defra would seek to recover from you. We note from other correspondence which we have seen that you have ‘limited resources’ and we do not favour this action, given that it may put the very future of your organisation at risk.”
The official lawyers for the UK government are basically saying on official letterhead (even their own filename contains “Letterhead”), “Hey, we heard you’re small. Well, we’re the world’s 6th largest economy, so we can put you out of business with legal bills if you don’t play ball.” Now, it’s not super-unusual to see a lawyer say something menacing about how if they win, you’ll have to pay their legal fees — even though that’s often not true in the US. What’s different here is that they dropped “if we win” and added “we will ruin you.” Stating that if someone doesn’t cooperate, your strategy will be to run up enough legal bills to put them out of business whether you win or not is a little different. It’s the sort of thing you expect to hear from the smarmy thug lawyer for the big bad corporation in a formulaic TV legal drama. We don’t generally see it in the real world from the legal representatives of a developed country.
Of course being in the UK I cannot possibly link to the relevant content, and of course I can only speculate as to the nature of the content.
I can also only speculate as to what might happen if you follow links on the above website.
I can only speculate that it might be the sort of behaviour that makes our country a laughing stock in the eyes of the world.
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