Host: Jen Ang

Quote: Louise Whitfield

I think there is so much more to be done with and, for disabled people to secure justice for them, it’s almost impossible to know where to start.

Jen Ang

Hi, everyone, and welcome to the Lawmanity podcast, where we explore the complex relationship between law and activism and discuss different ways law can oppress people, but can also lead to real social change.

I’m Jen Ang, human rights lawyer and activist based in Scotland and your host on the Lawmanity podcast.

This week we have three fabulous guests lined up for a special edition on disability rights. Get ready for a fearless and frank conversation about the state of disabled people’s rights in the UK, the role of strategic litigation in pressing for change and what more needs to be done for rights on paper to be realised in the lives of, of disabled people. 

Today we’ll start in Scotland, where we’ll be hearing from Heather Fiskin, Chief Executive of Inclusion Scotland since 2024, and from Tressa Burke one of Glasgow Disability Alliance’s founder members and Chief Executive since 2006.

Then we’ll head down to London to speak to Louise Whitfield, human rights lawyer and head of legal at the award winning civil rights NGO Liberty.

So let’s get started. First we’ll meet Heather. She began her career in the UK civil service, during which time she lost her hearing and joined ranks of profoundly deaf people. Now, Heather confessed when we recorded this interview:

Heather Fiskin

I never listened to a podcast in my life before because they tend not to be accessible. So I’ve kind of jumped the gun by being involved in one as a deaf person!

Jen Ang

Well, she smashed it, in my opinion. But you be the judge. After leaving the civil service, Heather moved to the newly formed Disability Rights Commission in 2000 and then went on to lead the Independent Living in Scotland project, first at the Equality and Human Rights Commission where it was hosted, and later at Inclusion Scotland, a Disabled People’s Organisation and a national network of Scottish DPOs. She became Chief Exec of Inclusion Scotland in 2024.

A mum of a teenager and human for a friendly and barky dog, her life revolves around responding to Mum, can I have Mum, where’s my. And hey, human, take me for a walk.

Heather, that was a beautiful introduction and it’s so nice to see you here today.

Heather Fiskin

Thank you, thank you, thank you for having me.

Jen Ang

So listen, in this podcast I have been experimenting with an opening question to get us settled and to help people learn a little more about the people behind the legends we’re interviewing. A good friend pointed out that our sense of smell is our oldest sense and observed that we can hold deep connections between the sense of smell and our memories.

So if you don’t mind, could you please tell me about a smell that is meaningful to you, Maybe a smell that you really like, or one that is connected to a time or place that you like to bring to mind.

Heather Fiskin

My mum, my gran were both brilliant cooks, lovely cooks. So I suppose if I had to pick one smell that’s really evocative. It’s Tuesday night and it’s pouring with rain in the middle of winter and Gran is visiting and she has made her mince and potatoes and apple tart, which is what you always made. And she was brilliant at apple tart. So, yeah, and it just makes you feel all safe and comfortable and young and full of hope again. And there is nothing better than your granny’s mince and potatoes. And I’m quite sure quite a lot of Scottish people watching this will go, yeah, mincing potatoes.

Jen Ang

Thank you so much, Heather. When you describe that I can almost smell that. I almost feel like I’m at your table. and I think many people, people have deep memories from their childhood about food they loved.

And now let’s bring Tressa Burke onto the podcast. Tressa, as I mentioned earlier, is Chief Executive of Glasgow Disability alliance, steering it from its fledgling vision of supporting disabled people’s voices and tackling social isolation in 2001 to the multi award winning community of more than 6,000 people. It is today in 2026. Welcome to the show today, Tressa.

Tressa Burke

Thanks so much. Thanks for having me.

Jen Ang

I asked Tressa to share with us, her memory of a favourite smell.

Tressa Burke

That’s an interesting question. I suppose thinking about something that takes me back is smell of my nana’s perfume. She used to wear Coty L’Aimant It was in a wee black bottle with a wee stick that you used to use to apply it. And it just takes me back thinking about that. I can smell it actually, as I’m saying the words.

Jen Ang

Oh, amazing, I love that. And finally, let’s welcome Louise Whitfield, Head of Legal at the NGO Liberty in London, joining us to talk about one of many groundbreaking cases she was involved in with DPO Inclusion London, a sister organisation to Heather’s Inclusion Scotland, where together they worked to challenge the closure of the Independent Living Fund and prevent a massive loss of services and support to disabled people across London.

I asked Louise to share a smell with our listeners that she finds important.

Louise Whitfield

I really love the smell of fresh mint and I like it because it is so refreshing and strong. And we have two different mint plants in our garden at the moment, which we pick to make fresh mint tea. And it is just such a great sensation to be able to smell it.

Jen Ang

Oh, I love that. It’s really transporting, actually, as you say that I can imagine your garden kind of the hot summer sun, which we do have a little bit of today as we’re recording. And, I also have mint in my garden and I’m actually thinking, yes, I must actually make more use of that. So thank you for sharing that, Louise.

So now we’re going to head straight into the tough questions. My first question for Heather and Tressa was, do you feel the law works equally for disabled people in Scotland today? And why or why not?

Heather Fiskin

I think the short answer is no, unfortunately, it should. It absolutely should. But now, and, I think the evidence spells that, we still have massive employment gap, disabled people are not getting jobs they applied for. We still have discrimination in every walk of life.

So the short answer is no, whether you’re looking at the statute or whether you’re looking at the system and the process. So, unfortunately not. I think also another example alongside employment, one that people maybe don’t think about unless it’s their area of expertise, is contract law. So where you have these big public contracts going on, and I know nothing about contract law. I mean, incredibly complicated, you know, that buildings, you know, big cityscapes are being built.

But where are disabled people in this? Even in the 21st century, when we have all these standards of what should be being produced and what should be being created for people to live and work in, they’re just not accessible.

And that goes on to the management of the building as well, and the way it’s maintained and operated on a daily basis. When you start getting, you know, the staff put the handbags and the rucksacks in the wheelchair accessible toilet, so what’s the point of having one? Or the cleaner ties up the rope.

But I would urge anybody listening to this if you do use an accessible toilet, because that’s the only option, or you’re with somebody who requires to use it and you see that emergency rope tied up, please untie it and get it back to the floor, because that’s what it’s meant to be.

So know, the statute is there. We do have a reasonably good statute, but it doesn’t operate in practise for all kinds of reasons.

Jen Ang

Heather refers to the statute here, by which she means the Equality Act 2010. The Equality act is a consolidating piece of legislation that was intended to modernise anti discrimination law across the uk.

This law was previously codified in many different acts, including the Equal Pay Act 1970, the Sex Discrimination Act 1975, the Race Relations Act 1976 and the Disability Discrimination Act 1995, plus others which prohibited discrimination on grounds of religious belief, sexual orientation and age. Now, the Equality Act created a single framework that prohibits direct and indirect discrimination on grounds of certain protected characteristics such as age, disability, sex and gender, race and religion, and so on, but only in England, Wales and Scotland.

Equalities legislation in Northern Ireland is governed by separate legislation specific to Northern Ireland, as well as an overarching duty on public authorities there, which is set out in section 75 of the Northern Ireland Act 1998.

Returning to Tressa, similar to Heather, she draws out the gaps between what the law provides and disabled people’s experiences of discrimination. In answering this question.

Tressa Burke

So complicated. It absolutely should, but it appears not to be the case from all the evidence that I’ve seen over my more than 30 year working life working with disabled people and for disabled people. So we have a raft of pieces of legislation.

So my background is I’m a social worker to trade. So I’m not just talking about the, you know, the Human Rights Act, the Disability Discrimination Act, the Equality Act. I’m also talking about the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act, the Disabled Persons Act, the Direct Payments Act, the Self Directed Support Act.

So there is a raft of legislation that tells disabled people that they should have rights across a whole range of areas. Some of them are about social care to enable independent living, some of them are about education and employment and provision of goods and services.

Yeah, I would confidently say that disabled people do not have those rights observed or realised across most of those areas. I don’t think there is any area where I could say that I think disabled people fully have the rights.

So, I mean, it’s a long answer, but I don’t think that the law is working for disabled people, for diverse disabled people who are not only people with conditions and impairments, but who are also black and minority, ethnic or people of colour. They are lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer. They are women, they are older people and younger people. So the law is not working for disabled people, but also very marginalised disabled people within that.

Jen Ang

So for you, as an activist and someone who has been working in this field for a long time, do you feel that in your work the law is a barrier or a tool or both in the struggle to achieve greater equality for people in communities that are marginalised and disadvantaged.

Heather Fiskin

It shouldn’t be a barrier, it should be a tool. It should be something that we can use and, readily use it. But it’s not easy to do that.

There’s all kinds of reasons why disabled people don’t use the law. And as individuals, disabled people and their families are up against a huge weight of officials involved in the law. Which piece of discrimination do you activate here? Which piece of discrimination are you challenging here?

Because from when you wake up in the morning until when you go to bed, and everything you do in between, whether that’s employment, learning, being a family member, trying to access services, socialise, use transport, use general services like shops etc. There’s discrimination in all of that. Which bit do you challenge? It’s exhausting.

What’s more, it’s not level playing field in terms of how exhausted you are. Because I had one ex colleague and I remember her telling me that she had something like 24 different professionals involved in her life. She had a filing cabinet in her hall for all of these different types of professionals involved in her life.

Another example is if you need an adapted car and assuming you get Motability through benefits and support for that, you must use Motability’s insurance. It’s incredibly expensive. You want to get it repaired, you have to go to a Motability garage. And again, incredibly expensive. Which bit of discrimination are we talking about?

And then we’ve got the really serious stuff, like people being refused health care, people who don’t have their social care needs met. You have people who. Or young people who have an educational needs assessment. Assuming you can get that in the first place and the needs aren’t being provided for, which one are we going for here?

And then, of course, where do you find the lawyer? Where do you find the lawyer who can and understands and has the competence and the willingness to take on your case? Where do you find the legal aid to do it if you’re not on the passport benefits for it? Where do you find the capacity and the time and the energy?

And one of the other things, perhaps the biggest thing really, or one of them is the fear, the fear of losing social care support if you try to challenge that.

Now, of course, there are complaint systems and things that come. You don’t jump straight into the legal process. Start with the local complaint systems and you work your way through the different bodies that you have to go to. But that’s exhausting. And DPOs would want to support this and agencies, advocacy agencies, and advisors would want to support that. But these agencies aren’t always accessible because they’re not disabled people’s organisations. They can’t always provide all the support.

I do remember somebody years ago, to be fair, who pulled out of working with a lawyer because the lawyer said, it takes me an extra hour, to speak to you because of your impairments, therefore I’m going to charge you double. And I was thinking that’s a reasonable adjustment. Shouldn’t you as a lawyer understand the concept of reasonable adjustment in the Equality Act? So it was very strange.

But go back to the fear thing. I remember going to an event in, a town up north and we m were being told by the parent of a disabled child about how their child had been excluded from the school trip because there was no wheelchair accessible bus. So they stayed at school in the library while everybody else went for a fun day out. And the mother tried to complain about this, but the problem was that in such a small rural place, and I think it’s important to remember what it can be like living in a rural place. The headmistress lived in the same street and, she didn’t feel she could take serious action, whether that be legal or complaints processes, knowing that this person was her neighbour.

Jen Ang

Some sobering reminders from Heather there about the multiple barriers that disabled people can face in seeking justice.

Tressa agreed that the law can be both a tool and a barrier.

Tressa Burke

Again, I think that’s another brilliant question. So I think it’s both. so, for example, I mean, it’s, you know, the Disability Discrimination Act wasn’t the act that we thought we were going to get in 1995, but it was a result of campaigning of disabled people and our movement rising up. And I was at the very beginnings of my working life at that point and so I was kind of just watching and learning on the sidelines. Similarly, if you look at the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Disabled People, that was a pretty much international movement of disabled people, the kind of final piece of human rights so far at that point, because disabled people had just not been getting their rights through all of these pieces of social work legislation, health and social care legislation, or even the Disability Discrimination Act, at, that time. And so we had the UNCRPD, which I think was ratified in 2009 with the exclusion of education actually across the UK at that point.

But there have been moves and campaigns from disabled people and our movement, which tends to be led by disabled people led organisations, and that’s really Important because disabled people are so marginalised and so oppressed and without capacity or agency that you do needed the organisations of disabled people, led by disabled people to be able to support them, to be able to rise up and make demands and learn about their rights and then ask for those rights to be realised.

It should be a, tool, but it can be more of a barrier.

And what we find, for example, what I mean by that is if you look at situations of social care where somebody maybe threatens judicial review, the next thing the case is settled and so we don’t have case law established and you know, on a case by case basis that seems to be how local authorities resolve things where they think they might lose. So where it could be a tool, I mean it is a tool for that person, the threat of it is helping that individual, but it’s not changing the systemic inequalities or barriers that people are facing.

So I think it’s both. It’s both a barrier and a tool. A barrier because people can’t afford to access legal justice. They can’t afford, not just in financial terms and I would argue that is the biggest barrier, but actually in terms of capacity, emotional energy. You know being disabled and relying on services is a battle, your life is a battle and people don’t always have the energy for what’s required. But I would suggest from evidence and from working with thousands of people, they mainly don’t have the money. So it is both.

Jen Ang 

So what needs to be done basically to address that rightly put criticism?

Tressa Burke

I mean the obvious thing to me, so I wouldn’t know all the answers to this, but it seems to me that if people had better access to legal aid, I think that would really, really help. But I think there needs to be more interest and you know, almost promotion of people’s rights.

So that would come from our own movement from DPOs that we tell people about their rights, but there then needs to be the joining up with the lawyers who can help us access those rights and claim them and you know, rightfully challenge where inequalities arise, another barrier. So I’m not 100% sure of where this is at now, but certainly with the DP it always had to be individuals bringing the challenge rather than groups of people or organisations. And that was very off putting.

So there was a, very good example many years ago. I’m trying to think exactly when this would have been. It would have been I think the 2000s and we’d booked the city chambers for a conference for Glasgow Disability Alliance members, and they cancelled the booking and we met with them to debrief about it. and my colleague asked if she could record the meeting because she wasn’t able to take notes because of her impairment, and they foolishly agreed. And, you know, we have them on tape and we didn’t do anything with this, but we did have them on tape saying that the reason they’d cancelled the booking was because disability was in the title and essentially it was a blanket discrimination against the fact that it was Glasgow Disability Alliance. And what they were saying was. So they weren’t wholly wrong, what they were saying was that the City Chambers was not accessible in Glasgow to disabled people in terms of fire escape.

But however, on the same week that we were having that, they were hosting a party for the Older People’s Forum, or whatever it was, many of whom were disabled. So there was that juxtaposition at that time.

We took that to the Disability Rights Commission for a bit of advice, just to see where we stood. And they said, hands down, you will win that. And we said, what we win? And they said, you win maybe a couple of thousand pounds. So this is going right back, we’re going back in time to the early 2000s, what we decided to do, because we were at that point, this was before we had proper funding, we were all working in other places and we were a, loose committee becoming a board, I think, at that time.

And we decided instead to work with the council to try and help them make the chambers more accessible. And we actually thought that was better for disabled people than us. Having two grand towards GDA may have been helpful, but we wanted to change things rather than to just win the case. And we didn’t really fully understand that might have helped change things if we had won the case. But I think that was a barrier.

So, like, one of the things was that it would have had to be taken in one person’s name. So there’s things like that that can just create barriers where it exposes people, it makes them vulnerable, certainly when you’re talking about social care.

So, I raise this issue repeatedly because it’s such an important part of disabled people’s lives. We are definitely disproportionately dependent on services, health and social care and wider services, which means that people are very frightened about rocking the boat. So where they don’t feel that they’re getting their needs met, where they’re maybe being discriminated against, maybe feeling brutalised by the system, maybe feel that they’ve been treated badly by a social worker. They’re very frightened and reluctant to complain or to claim those rights, partly because they don’t have any evidence of people doing well in that kind of, complaint system, and partly just they’re frightened that it’s going to result in worse treatment and worse cuts.

So I think the law and the legal system has a role to play there about widening access to legal, advice and legal justice. But also disabled people feeling confident that if they do bring the challenge, it can actually go somewhere. One thing that my members, my very active members say regularly to me is they have to work hard on not giving up, because we tell them all the time about all the different treaties and conventions, about ICSECR, about the UNCRPD, the Human Rights Act, all the different pieces of legislation, and yet they still don’t have the rights.

And they are saying, quite rightly, what is the point of us having these rights if we can never have them realised or challenge them in any meaningful way? You know, I always think that justice is so obvious, that it should all be about social justice, but of course, legal justice isn’t about that, at all.

And it is varying degrees of how committed people are to social justice, but it’s a lot about the process rather than the morality of what is right or wrong. And I think disabled people get confused in that as well. They don’t understand why the law is not more on their side. So I think it must be a really complicated thing from the perspective of lawyers as well, and people in the justice system.

I think the other thing I hear is that the judiciary seem to not want to go too far to wade in a matters that are going to be a cost to the public purse. So we’ve seen really unhelpful cases where it’s been upheld that, it’s fine for a disabled person to sit in their own waist because it’s cheaper for the local authority to suggest a supercontinence pad than it is for them to have a social care worker, even where the person isn’t incontinent. And I know things have been contested and, you know, things have gone back and forward, but that kind of reluctance of the judiciary to get involved in what they may be considered to be political issues or issues for local authorities, for the public purse, that is not helpful, because where the law starts and stops, we are not really very clear about. As, disabled people.

Jen Ang

Tressa has pointed out  gaps in accessing justice arise not only where people lack financial and emotional resources to be litigants, but also where the justice system is designed to deliver narrow outcomes for individuals, but does not provide procedural routes to justice that would create such systemic change.

Heather adds to this picture, reminding us that the workings of law and justice need to be visible for people to want to engage their rights.

Heather Fiskin

And, sometimes I feel that case law is invisible. I think disabled people in the community would take much more strength in, considering taking action legally if they could see more case law, if they could hear from more people who have gone through the process. And I do completely understand why people don’t want to do that. They must be shattered by the end of it and they just want to get on with the last. I know that employment tribunals probably have quite a high caseload of discrimination cases in relation to disability, and that’s not the be all and end all. You know, there are other elements like social care, education, access to services, etc. And I think that we need more of the good ones and we need more visibility of the case law aim, and what that can do.

Jen Ang

Heather and Tressa have both spoken about the value of strategic litigation and also making visible the process of using the law and the courts to affect change as an important tool for campaigners working towards disability justice.

This feels like a good time to bring Louise Whitfield back into the conversation in order to pick up my conversation with her about the use of strategic litigation from a lawyer’s perspective.

We’re here today to help listeners understand how you and colleagues use strategic litigation to challenge the closure of the Independent Living Fund and to hear a little more about your role in leading that litigation in coordination with a wider campaign and your reflections over 10 years on, I think, from that series of significant legal challenges. So, to start with, can you please explain to us just how you got started with the campaign and what it was about?

Louise Whitfield

Thanks, Jen. I’m going to give you a little bit more background than you’ve actually asked for because I think it’s really important to understand how I came to the case and who else was involved with it. But it really dates back to, going out to lunch about 15 years ago with a brilliant disabled activist called Kevin Caulfield, who persuaded me to help him set up a legal network for deaf and disabled people’s organisations. He felt that there was a real disconnect between, between lawyers who were representing disabled people in the cases they ran for them and disabled people themselves.

And, once we got the network going, we ran a number of meetings looking at issues that were really relevant for disabled people and what the legal solutions might be. They were very well attended by disabled people and by lawyers, although that was quite a long time ago now. And I think that the network struggled during the lockdowns of the pandemic and that Kevin is keen to get the network going again.

But I think it was key to getting the case off the ground, as was the involvement of Inclusion London in the network and the case overall. And it was because we were having those network meetings that it was raised with me and a couple of other solicitors, that this was massive for disabled people, the closure of the Independent Living Fund, because it was so crucial to their ability to live independently, as the name suggests. And it seemed absolutely essential, obvious that we should look at whether a legal challenge would actually be possible.

Jen Ang

What were some of the challenges that you faced in running the legal case and coordinating with the campaign? Were there tricky moments?

Louise Whitfield

I think one of the key challenges in that case, and a lot of the cases I’ve done like this, are bringing everyone with you when you’ve got thousands of people directly affected. And me and the other two solicitors had, I think, six clients between us, all with different perspectives and different experiences and different opinions about what we should be saying in court and how we should be running the cases.

So that was one of the trickier moments. But I think it wasn’t as tricky as a lot of cases I’ve done, because everybody had the same fundamental goal in sight. And I felt that the claimants and the lawyers were really well supported by Inclusion London and that it was really crucial having a deaf and disabled people’s organisation involved in the litigation and really understanding the litigation and helping to steer us through any tricky moments.

Jen Ang

And just to make sure that our listeners understand what exactly was the change that you were seeking and that you managed to secure, through your litigation? And also in working with the campaign?

Louise Whitfield

It’s quite a complicated story, actually, in terms of what we tried to achieve and. And how we didn’t actually get there. But what we were hoping to do was to stop the government closing the Independent Living Fund, which was crucial additional funding for severely disabled people above and beyond what they were entitled to from their local authorities. So it made a massive difference to thousands of people’s lives in terms of their ability to live independently, and we were trying to stop the government closing it.

What made the case particularly complicated was that the way the decision was taken and the success of the challenge meant that the government could simply take the decision again and decide lawfully to close the fund anyway. So we had one of those sort of, not quite a pyrrhic victory, but it was a victory that only gave a bit of respite for a short period of time. And although we brought a second challenge, that was unsuccessful in challenging the second decision to close the Independent Living Fund. So it did still close, but we bought a bit of time for people. There were some sort of related wins, some good impacts that I’m happy to share, if that would be useful, that weren’t about a, legal change and weren’t about winning the case.

But what was particularly interesting, and it loops back round to Inclusion London’s involvement as well, it is that a couple of years after the case, I was at a roundtable run by some legal researchers looking at strategic litigation. And I was there, along with people doing the similar kind of work to me and another really brilliant disabled activist called Svetlana Kotova from Inclusion London. And when I was talking about the ILF case and I said, well, we won in the Court of Appeal, but then we lost the second JR, so it didn’t make any difference. She actually disagreed.

She felt the case had made a huge difference for a number of reasons. One was that we got the court to agree with us that the government hadn’t listened to disabled people properly, that they hadn’t looked at the really significant impact on disabled people. And that was a massive achievement in itself. And I think that it also, Svetlana felt strongly that we got a level of publicity that had never really been experienced by disabled people before. We were on the 10 o’ clock news on the BBC that night, which had never really happened.

And I think it was felt that those things happening in that context, although they fell a long way short of what we were actually trying to achieve in terms of keeping the fund open, it definitely brought things to the fore and we got real engagement from the court. And I’ve actually got a quote from one of the judges, if that’s helpful, because I think this really encapsulated how we were able to persuade the court that something had gone really wrong.

And Lord Justice Elias said, in my opinion, neither the Equality Impact assessment nor the document setting out in response to the consultations, both published on the same day as the decision was made, identifies in sufficiently unambiguous, terms the inevitable and considerable adverse effect which the closure of the fund will have, particularly on those who will, as a consequence, lose the ability to live independently.

And that felt, like a very strong vindication of the claimants. Everybody who’d been campaigning on the issue. And exactly what the government had missed, what was awful about the follow up decision where the government decided to close the Independent Living Fund anyway and we lost the second JR was that the government didn’t care that that was what was going to happen.

And we had done our best and we tried really hard and obviously the wider campaign tried really hard. But when I was rereading the judgments, I was really struck by the fact that the judge in the second Judicial Review did not mention any of the claimants by name at all. So there was almost a sort of, I felt, quite stark contrast between the level of engagement of the judges in the first Judicial Review at the Court of Appeals stage and that judge in the second one. And that’s all disabled people want is to be heard and understood and, their opinions to be valued. And that was what the government had got wrong here.

Jen Ang

Gosh, as you describe it, that is such a roller coaster of developments, if you like, through the history of this case. But something that you raised just struck me as, very true to my own experience. And it’s this point that sometimes as a lawyer or in technical terms you can see it that you’ve lost the case or you’ve lost the outcome that you were looking to achieve.

But in many ways, supporting people in communities to sort of to seek a hearing or to seek justice or to raise an issue in the public discourse is a kind of success. As you say, Svetlana has pointed out, it’s a kind of win. I wonder, again, thinking about this, if we were now over 10 years on to see a set of challenges like this again today. And I actually, unfortunately, it’s not entirely hypothetical. Right. Because I certainly know that here in Scotland, I have, recently have been consulted on similar threats to funding for disabled people to lead dignified lives. Would you run this the same as you did? And do you think the outcome would be the same or different? And there are two kind of very different questions. I know, but just 10 years on, you know, what are your reflections about a case like this coming up again?

Louise Whitfield

I think those are really interesting questions that I’ve given quite a bit of thought to because I think one of the issues in the case was the fact that we were challenging the closure of the fund to current recipients. It had already been closed to new applicants like the previous year, and nobody had challenged that decision. And that made the case more difficult presentationally. And a lot of the government’s defence was we’re just trying to make this fair for everybody. And that caused us problems within the case.

If I had my time again, I would go back and challenge that first decision that closed the fund to new applicants, because that was such a fundamental decision. And I think if, you know, if the legal network had been up and running at that point, maybe we would have caught that in time.

But I still think it’s such a shame and it’s so disappointing in so many ways that a legal challenge wasn’t brought in relation to that first decision to close the fund to new applicants.

I think the second thing about what, what I would do differently or what arguments I would run is I think I would actually run, you know, convention rights arguments. I would say this has to be a breach of Article 8, this has to be a breach of Article 14 here.

Jen Ang

In thinking about how she might bring this case today, 10 years on, Louise is speaking about including arguments raising a potential breach of human rights under articles 8 and 14 of the European Convention on Human Human rights or the ECHR. Article 8 of the ECHR guarantees our right to a private and family life and Article 14 is the prohibition against the discrimination in the enjoyment of any of the rights guaranteed in the ECHR.

Taken together, a human rights based argument would make the case the government’s decision was an unlawfully disproportionately discriminatory one in preventing disabled people from enjoying a private and family life of, of the same quality as people who are not disabled. 

Louise continues, explaining the value of making bold arguments.

Louise Whitfield 

And I think that although it’s very difficult to also run private law equality arguments, saying this treats disabled people less favourably than non disabled people, I think there is something about the way we litigate these cases where we are not bold enough to say to the court, you are creating a situation where a significant number of people will not be able to live independently that cannot be lawful. Would be. I mean, that’s a pretty bold submission. But you get the point that challenges around things like the equality duty or the failure to consult is just about the process. Whereas I think I would want to try a quite challenging legal case that basically said you cannot take this level of support away from people. That’s a breach of human rights.

Jen Ang

I love that and I’d love to see you bring a challenge like that. What more needs to be done to secure justice for the people you fought for here? do you think justice has been done?

Louise Whitfield

I think there is so much more to be done with and for disabled people to secure justice for them, it’s almost impossible to know where to start. You know, the right to independent living being a reality would be a good starting point, you know, to actually acknowledge that lots of disabled people can’t live independently and they should have a right to do so. I think the Government’s new welfare, bill just fills me with despair in terms of the impact on disabled people. And again, kind of carve outs that protect in inverted commas current recipients of benefits, but leave out in the cold people who might make claims in the future. I think it is. I just cannot, I cannot see how that is fair or just in any way. and there’s a range of issues that make it so clear that disabled people don’t have equality in the uk.

Jen Ang

With that reflection from Louise, let’s return now to Heather and Tressa. I asked them both, if disabled people are still a long way from achieving equality in the uk, what does justice look like for you?

Heather Fiskin

Well, I suppose that goes to justice achieved justice in practise. When it’s happening, we wouldn’t have a need for justice because there would be no injustice. So I’m not a lawyer, so that’s the kind of thing I will say.

So justice would look like the progressive and the forward fronting legislation, like, do not, you know, you must make reasonable adjustments, you must do your public sector equality duty and progressively work towards equality. All these things would be happening. There wouldn’t be a case of public authorities going, oh, I have to do this report. And I wrote this down to say this. And I will say, I always remember when I was working in the Disability Rights Commission, when the first disability quality duty reports came out from local authorities, we could actually see where they had cut and pasted off each other. No thought had been put into it whatsoever. It would be funny if it wasn’t so bad.

So justice would look like ready availability of support, a willingness to see the law as, ah, a route that is accessible, attainable, appropriate, when it is, and something that’s for you, it’s for everybody.

Tressa Burke

Tressa agrees, adding, so social justice for disabled people, and if they were having all their legal rights realised and fulfilled, would be about having access to a meaningful life and a life of purpose and a life of choices.

It would be about participation. It would be about being included in their communities and their families in wider society. It would be about having a job, a job that pays well. A job, a job where the employer knows what access to work is, the scheme itself, the programme of support, but also what access in the workplace means. It would be about disabled people not living in abject and deep and long term poverty. It would be about disabled people, you know, accessing the health and social care services that they need. So, you know, in terms of social justice, it would be all of those things.

Fairness, freedom, having dignity, having choices, and the same choices as non disabled people take for granted. So when we are talking about choices like that, sometimes disabled people aren’t able to choose when they get up, what they wear, if they wear anything, when they have a shower, if they have a shower. We’re frequently told about disabled people being told that they’re only entitled to so many showers a week or a month. These are the types of, of, you know, breaches to human rights that we’re talking about.

United Nations declared disabled people’s lives a human catastrophe in 2017 on the back of what had happened after the financial collapse and then austerity imposed by the government at that time and the reverberations to the settlements to the local devolved administrations and in turn their local authorities. So it was about benefits, but it was also about cuts to services.

In 2024, they reviewed the situation and there had been regressions. Rather than things getting better, there had been regressions. They saw no advancement of rights, they saw nothing but regressions. And further, UN ambassadors and commentators have said that there should be more money invested in social care, there should be more money invested into Social Security.

So local authorities are, ah, struggling for sure and local government funding is definitely an issue, but it is about choices and disability is a political and a social and economic choice and disabled people need to be prioritised. So I know that’s a long winded answer, but these are the ways that disabled people’s lives would look if they were, you know, having the rights and their freedoms observed and realised and we would have access to that redress, which at this point in time we just don’t have.

Jen Ang

And finally, I asked all three of our guests to share some advice for our listeners. Advice that perhaps they would give to themselves as a young activist or lawyer or to someone who wants to be them when they grow up.

Louise Whitfield

That’s such an interesting question. I would say if you’re a lawyer, find an area you really care about and listen to your clients. I think that what often goes wrong is people are practising in areas sometimes for the wrong reasons, sometimes it’s not something that really, they are really, really committed to. And I think I definitely felt a degree of, increased commitment when I was representing disabled people because I felt the situation was so unjust. I was so compelled to try to assist them.

But I learned so much from my disabled clients. I think it was really interesting that it gave me genuine insights into their lives that I would have had no experience of in any other setting. And it made me acutely aware of things like how do you set up joint in person meetings for a legal network when your own office is not fully accessible, then what do you do? And how you have to push and push and push on all those issues across the board to be able to represent people properly.

So I think, it’s a combination of finding an area of law that’s really important to you personally, but also really listening to your clients and the people directly affected.

Jen Ang

Heather had this to say:

Heather Fiskin

Just keep doing it, keep doing it. If you are in the right, then be in the right, own it, own your space and collectivise with other people. The strength in collectivising, not just within your own community, but with allied communities.

And Jen, you and I go back some way and I’ve always wanted to do more work in our organisation around justice, but like many DPOs, we don’t have the funding. I think that the digital world has really opened up activism in a low cost kind of way. But just keep going for it and collectivise. Use your allies, give to your allies as well. You never know when you’re going to need them. and just keep going. If you’re in the right, then you’re on the right path, basically.

Jen Ang

And Tressa agrees. Also leaning into the power of collectivising allyship and peer support.

Tressa Burke

Oh, my goodness, that’s a hard question. run a mile, don’t do it. No, I think, know that you can’t do everything. Do what you can and don’t do it alone. Build allies, build friends, build support. I think, really, I feel, I feel as though I’m a builder. And, you can see that because GDA has almost 6,000 members now. and it’s not just me, it’s never been just me. It’s always been a collective cause.

And I think that holding onto that peer support is so important. It’s important to our members, but it’s also important to Chief Execs supporting each other. To me, with my team supporting each other, you know, we don’t get dissuaded from the cause and from the mission and we support each other doing it.

But the other, I suppose, piece of advice would be to myself, don’t get too upset when you know you’re going to get knocked down. But, just get back up, just keep getting back up. But you need support to do that, and that’s why the support is so important, because you can keep going if you’ve got the support, but if you’re doing it all alone or if you feel that you’re taking it all on your own, that’s too much. So but yeah, keep going. It’s worth it. It’s worth it because you’re helping people change their lives and have a better life.

Jen Ang

And that’s a wrap! Thank you our lovely listeners for joining us for another episode of the Lawmanity Podcast. 

If you wanted to learn more about some of the campaigns that Heather Tressa and Louise have mentioned, will put those in the show notes. And for those of you legal beagles out there, we’ll also add some details about the legal challenge I discussed with Louise, as well as some ways in which you can take action to support current campaigns for disability justice. 

Next week, join us for a one to one interview with Satwat Rehman, Chief Executive of One Parent Family Scotland or OPFS, We speak to her about the challenges of using the law to secure justice for families in poverty in including single parents, as well as the importance of movements rooted in community and how solutions may require lawyers and communities to work together for change. If you love today’s episode, please do hit the like and subscribe buttons and share our episodes with friends and colleagues who might also enjoy learning a little bit more about how the law really works in practise and how it can be used to make the world a better, brighter place. 

The Lawmanity podcast is co produced by me, your host Jen Ang and the brilliant and talented Natalia Uribe. Shout out to Halina Rafai for mentoring us through our first year of this incredible project and thanks also to Amanda Ameshi on graphics and socials. The music you’ve been listening to is Always on the Move by Musicians in Exile, a Glasgow based music project led by people seeking refuge in Scotland. 

Thanks so much for tuning in today. We hope you enjoyed listening and stay. See you next time.

Host: Jen Ang

Quote: Dr Pinar Aksu

“The first immigration law we had in the UK was the 1905 Alien Act. And then when you compare that to the current immigration laws we have under language, when you look at the language of the way it’s been described within legislations, but also within the title of the law is Bell, it makes you question, has anything changed since more than 100 years ago? “

Jen Ang

So hello and welcome to the Lawmanity podcast, where we explore the complex relationship between law and activism and discuss the different ways the law can oppress people, but can also lead to real social change.

I’m Jen Ang, a human rights lawyer and activist based in Scotland and your host on the Lawmanity podcast. 

This week we’re talking to Dr. Pinar. Aksu. Pinar is a researcher at the University of Glasgow, a theatre maker and an award-winning human rights campaigner. Her work sits at the powerful intersection of art, justice and activism. 

Pinar was previously advocacy coordinator at Maryhill Integration Network in Glasgow, working on projects for welcoming people seeking asylum and refuge in the community, which is where we first met together. We worked on migrant justice campaigns, including the Our Grades Not Visas campaign, which we discussed in an earlier podcast episode with Andy Sirel of JustRight Scotland, as well as advocacy around the Scottish Franchise Bill, which extended voting and candidacy rights in Scottish elections to people with indefinite and limited leave to remain widening pathways to political participation for migrants, the benefits of which we have finally seen in the most recent round of, Scottish parliamentary elections in 2026. 

Pinar’s doctoral research, Art and Law and Migration, draws together all these threads using art practises drawn from Theatre of the Oppressed methodology to produce Cycle of Migration, a play about access to justice and the immigration system, written and performed by people with living experience of that system.

I’m so, so pleased to have you here, Pinar. You’re one of my very favourite people and I think that that introduction describes the huge range of things that interest you, but also the many places where you contribute to social change in Scotland. So welcome to.

Dr. Pinar Aksu

Thank you.

Jen Ang

So, listen, I have a kind of opener question. In this podcast, I have been experimenting with a way to get us settled and also help people learn about the person behind the legends who we’re interviewing. So if you don’t mind, can you tell me about a smell that’s meaningful to you? Maybe one that you really like, or one that’s connected to a place or time that you like to bring to mind?

Dr. Pinar Aksu

Yeah, I was actually thinking about this, the other day and someone that previously asked me the same question. I really love the smell of marigolds, the flower of marigolds, because they come in, like, different sizes, shapes, but also they’re usually yellow, red, orange colour. I just love the flower, the smell of it. and that’s because my gran used to have lots in her garden and it reminds me of my childhood. 

Well, I’m trying to grow it also in my balcony this year. I don’t think I’ve been successful, but previous years it’s. It’s been a success. Yeah, I just. The smell of marigold is so fresh and it just reminds me of my gran’s garden. It reminds me of my childhood with her. and sometimes, I would get her to send pictures or show her little garden and see how they’re growing. Yeah, it’s a task to grow in Scotland, but it does happen. Not, this year.

Jen Ang

Well, thank you for sharing that. And I’m totally transported. I actually. My mother also had a garden full of marigolds when I was little. And actually, when you say it, that I’m imagining I’m remembering the smell of, like a hot, dry summer, actually, I think. And it’s quite. It’s quite sweet and sort of dusty, you know, and. Yeah, that’s. That’s lovely. so thank you for sharing. I have never, tried to grow them here in Scotland, so wishing you luck.

Dr. Pinar Aksu

It is easy to grow. But what I did last year was after I tried to reuse the seeds, so I just, you know, plugged out and then put it in a little jar. I’ve done. I’ve been doing that for three, four years now, but. But this year, I don’t know what happened. Maybe they were too dry or, the soil wasn’t the right texture or it was just. Yeah, it was just not right. So this year it didn’t grow, which is sad, but other little flowers managed to come out, which is good.

Jen Ang

Well, onwards and good luck with next year. But thank you for. Thank you so much for sharing that. and so now I wanted to move kind of to. Actually, the key questions for today that I had for you. the first one is quite broad, but it’s this, we’re thinking about law and social change. I wonder if just now, if you feel the law is working equally for you or for your community, however you choose to define that, and why or why not.

Dr. Pinar Aksu

This is a question I’ve explored within my research in the PhD and it was something generated interesting dialogue about the role of law and how it is used and who it benefits. So within my work, I work in the migration sector, especially people who are seeking asylum and refuge. I think witnessing the changes of the immigration law has been really interesting in the last few years and also observing the pattern of the laws that was generated over the time. I mean the first immigration law we had in the UK was the 1905 Alien Act.

And then when you compare that to the current immigration laws we have under language, when you look at the language of the way it’s been described within the legislations, but also within the title of the law as well, it makes you question, has anything changed since more than 100, years ago? 

We still use similar divisive languages within the law when we are talking about movement, when we’re designing and defining what migration is. And I think that is very disappointing to see that nothing has really changed. What’s been interesting for me is since I’ve started my PhD, every single year there was a new law on immigration that has passed. So we had the Nationality, and Borders Act and then we had the Illegal Migration Act and then we had the Rwanda Act and now we have a new bill that’s being proposed in the Parliament as well. So that’s been very crucial for me to witness it and see how the law itself is developed and to see who it benefits. 

And I find that problematic because when you see a lot of the structural problems within migration, whether that is not having the right to work for people who are in the asylum process or whether that is using hotel accommodation in the communities, a lot of these policies are written within the law, which makes it possible for it to be implemented and enacted. So that makes me question, is the problem the law itself that we have, what would happen if we didn’t have these laws that said about criminalising people who are taking unsafe routes, so called illegal routes, if, yeah, we didn’t have these policies, what would happen? Would people still be treated differently? 

And I think that helps me to define how I see law and what, how law is seen by, by people. And that’s something we always talk about within the community as well. And it becomes quite depressive when you have to keep the momentum up. You have to be like, okay, let’s work on this project or let’s continue to challenge this policy. But then when the policy itself and the law itself becomes more violent over the years, that also demotivates people and asks the question of, well, nothing is changing. It’s been five years, six years, such as for the Right to Work campaign, we’re not seeing any changes, but we are seeing actually more hostility within the law that it gives. Yeah, it gives the, I would say, the gateway to be implemented and become more violent. I think that’s how I would view the law itself. And, obviously it sometimes benefits certain people. It doesn’t benefit other people who really need protection. Yeah, I think that’s. That’s how I would define it. 

I also find it fascinating the way the performative side of the law as well, and that’s something I’ve been looking into for my research about how the laws are designed, how legislations are designed, how they are being proposed, such as in House of Lords, House of Commons. And then you have this monarchy, and then you have this place where decisions are being made by a elite group of people who are, I think, truly disconnected from realities. And the performative side element of it, of the fact that it’s. It’s just, yeah, group of people making decisions for thousands and millions of people. And then that makes me question, is this what we want and is this how the law should be drafted? What about people’s voices? Can we have a structure where we reimagine how the law should be and how that should look like?

Jen Ang

So for you, then, where you stand now, with all your experience and your research, do you feel that the law can be a tool for social change? Or is it more a barrier for change in the areas that matter to you? So if we’re seeking equality, where do you sit? Or is there a little bit of both?

Dr. Pinar Aksu

Yeah, I think it’s a combination. And it depends who uses the law and how they use the law. It’s a combination because when we talk about migration, such as right now, the new, Borders Bill, that’s being gone through and being debated, that’s going to make things very difficult for a lot of people. And that is using the law and how can we challenge that is very difficult, I think, as activists or even people who are lawyers themselves or by the general public, because I think we have reached a certain, state or we have reached a moment in the UK that becomes very difficult to intervene and challenge. 

And the government is able to just pass policies just there and here, just like that. And that, for me, is concerning for democracy and is concerning for all of us. And everyone should be concerned. If, if a government is easily able to pass such a bill or being debated, never mind being enacted as a act yet or implemented, then it’s concerning what they will do in different areas of human rights for a lot of the people. That said, obviously there are lawyers out, there who uses the law to protect people and who uses the law to find different ways to uphold their human rights and find different mechanisms as well. and I think it’s a difficult one because they are challenging the law itself as lawyers, but then it’s the law that’s the problem. Yeah. 

And I find, I respect that needs to happen, but at the same time, yes, it’s very difficult when there’s a policy that’s been passed. How do you reverse that? How do you mobilise the whole community, the whole country basically, to say what you’ve written there is wrong and how do we change that? And I think, yeah, there’s a combination of how it could be challenged, but how it could be used positively as well.

Jen Ang

So you’re speaking about the role of lawyers and kind of this interesting bind, which is that lawyers may be using the law to challenge the law, but let’s be honest, it’s lawyers that wrote the law as well, and they’re challenging that law within a system. Are they friend or foe, allies or adversaries? What’s your view of the legal profession in the context of the work that you’re trying to do?

Dr. Pinar Aksu

I think especially for immigration lawyers at the moment, they experience great pressure regarding supporting their clients, as they call like clients. Whether that’s because there are funding cuts for legal aid, whether that’s because the regulations change so quickly that they must submit an evidence for someone’s asylum claim and they have one week to do this and they have so many clients and how do they do that? The fact that in different areas of the uk, obviously there’s different legal aid, implementations, and the impact on that is on lawyers is severe. 

And we see that, when we. When we work with people, or when you’re trying to, direct people to access justice, access lawyers, we can’t really say you should go with this lawyer, but we’re able to say, here are a list of lawyers or here’s at the website in Scotland for all immigration lawyers. You can go on, decide which lawyer is best suitable for you. But then we also know that there is a waiting time and there’s capacity issue as well, where law firms are at capacity of accepting new clients and that, becomes problematic. Then what happens to the person, they have to keep trying different lawyers, but at the same time they miss appointments from the home Office, then they get penalised and then they have the trust of Luck within the law and with the lawyers. 

I also witness people becoming really angry with lawyers. And we try to talk this out and I think that happens because somebody messages their lawyer, they don’t get a reply, maybe in a day or two. And then they start panicking, they get anxious and say, why am I not getting any response from the lawyer? Are, they just ignoring me? And then you try to explain, well, maybe they’re on holiday or they’re at a court or they’ve got, they’re dealing with other cases. So there is that miscommunication with the, with lawyer and clients as well and which can lead to distrust, between themselves as well. Again, no one is at ah, fault here. It’s the fact that there’s no capacity within the legal team, maybe within the lawyers and there are so much more clients and cases that needs to be, that needs to be addressed.

Jen Ang

At this point. In our interview, Pinar has set out quite clearly the consequences of year on year real money cuts in legal aid funding for immigration lawyers and the resultant collapse in the provider base of legal aid law firms. The situation is so bad in England and Wales that 57% of people who need a legal aid lawyer for an immigration matter and who are eligible and have a right to that lawyer are not able to find one. That means that more than half of the people who require help with immigration representation in England and Wales are not getting it and are forced to represent themselves in Scotland. Although the situation is not yet as severe, Pinar has clearly described a similar situation – people who are eligible for legal aid and have a right to a lawyer and who do need one, do not realistically have any expectation of being able to find one with the capacity and willingness to take on their case. 

Shifting to alternatives, Pinar then goes on to talk about a different approach to lawyering, which she encouraged and facilitated during her own time as a community organiser at the Maryhill Integration Network. This is known as community lawyering, a model of social justice lawyering where lawyers seek to decenter themselves from how they work with clients. Instead of seeing the lawyer as the centre or the focus of the work, a community lawyer will centre the communities facing injustice and try to find ways of working that generates ideas, goals and strategies that start with and are directed by the communities themselves. 

A community can mean a geographic community, such as the people of Maryhill or the people of Govan and Glasgow, but it can also mean a community of interest, defined as people drawn together and identifiable by having similar identities, experiences or facing similar challenges. Such as people seeking asylum or disabled people, or unpaid carers or neurodiverse people. Community lawyering can take many forms, but a starting place is for lawyers to actually physically leave their offices and go out into the community to listen, to learn, to educate and to be educated. 

In this next part of the interview, Pinar talks about working alongside Andy Sirel of JustRight Scotland as community organiser and community lawyer working together. She goes on to talk about how she met Ahmed Al Hindi and the very start of the Our Grades Not Visas campaign, which Andy also spoke about with us in an earlier episode of the Lawmanity podcast.

Dr. Pinar Aksu

We do work with lawyers, and especially immigration lawyers, and I have friends and colleagues who do fantastic work. I know you were talking about the colleagues at JustRight Scotland, especially with Andy, who we worked on the Campaign for Access to Education on Our Grades Not Visas, which I think was an amazing example of how a company could be successful when you work with the communities in a, compassionate. 

And I’m using more of a human rights approach within the community and I think that’s something I have been trying to work on, where people are informed about the changes within the law and people are able to see lawyers at a community setting. So it’s not just, oh, we go to the office, I have a legal appointment and that’s it. And this is something I’ve been able to do over the past few years within my role, where I think it’s important for the immigration lawyers to come to the community setting and to meet people and also to hear their stories and for them to explain. It depends on the topic. 

So, for example, we welcomed Andy and other lawyers as well. A friend of mine who’s, Abed, he came to our group a few times as well, where we invited them and asked them to talk about the recent changes. So when the Rwanda plan was. The offshoring of people seeking asylum to Rwanda was being discussed. So we invited Andy and, Abed as well, different times for them to talk about what this means, what does it look like? Who is it going to impact? And we did that by asking them to come to the community setting and to explain in a way that it’s more accessible for people. So it’s not just, oh, yeah, article one says this and then. Because that way people are just going to zone out and they’re not going to listen. So we wanted. I was. I made it very clear all the time, like, we need to make this more accessible, maybe even do some group activity. Let’s talk about, what do you think about the Rwanda plan? And I think that worked really well and that way we were able to create that connection and people felt more comfortable of, oh, okay, I don’t have to be too scared when I go to see my lawyer. Because they’re also human being who has capacity. They’ve got, you know, they also need holidays, they also need time off. 

They also deal with a lot of traumatic experiences as well. Ah, within their work. And I think bridging that gap was so important for everyone that we, when we worked on the, Our Grades campaign, obviously, as it was founded by, the young person Ahmed. And I think that was really clear way of showing how we can work together with people who are experiencing the issue, then strategizing what methods we can use and then working together in collaboration of whether that’s with the lawyers or within the media. And, that’s what happened with Our Grades Not Visas. 

When we first met, Ahmed actually was, my colleague. It was at the Parents Council evening and my colleague said, oh, there’s a young person who wants to do this company. He just needs some guidance. Can I connect you with him? And I was like, yeah, sure, I’m happy to chat with him. And then we went for a coffee at Glasgow Uni, actually. And he was a young person. You mean, like, oh, I want to do this, do this. And I was, okay, let’s, let’s plan it out. Actually, we have a campaign on access to education for asylum seekers, so maybe we could do it all together. And then taking it from there, of, okay, let’s see who your allies are. Let’s get you speaking of the media and then finding out then there’s a legal case that’s going on, but then it’s not just one story, then trying to find out combine that this is many stories, and how we can use these many stories and experiences in a way that it will positively change for the many people in the long term as well. And I think that method was worked out. And sometimes when you do campaigning, things just plan out. 

And I love when that happens because you could sit down and be like, okay, we’re going to use this approach. We’re going to go to this place and you can spend weeks and months, but sometimes there are opportunities. You just grab it and you say, okay, this will be good if I do it now. and you just have to keep in that opportunities and find a good time, good moment and good partner as well who gets to work or who, who’s also dedicated at a level that you are dedicated. And I think that, yeah, that example of community work and then lawyers coming in the other thing which I think was fascinating in that case. But generally as well, when we have, when we welcome lawyers into community level and they, they see the people as people not as, okay, your service users, client, but going to listen, let’s just have a chat. And I think that expectation for me is also important where I say to the group members, you know, this lawyer is coming to speak to you, but if they’re not going to solve your case, you, you can ask questions, you can listen, you can learn. I think that’s also important and also for people not to feel intimidated. Oh, there’s a big name coming or there’s that lawyer coming. So and that’s something I m, I just say to people. You ask whatever you want to ask. you know, there’s no wrong question, no wrong answer. So just feel free to ask anything you want to. If it makes the other person uncomfortable, oh well, you know, that’s the whole purpose. So that generates that difficult conversation and that critical conversation.

Jen Ang

I love that. And I think it actually, you know, some of the things that you spoke through highlights the importance of understanding the dynamics that people might bring to a conversation with a lawyer. But also all of the careful work around building a long term partnership and a campaign and the fact that it may, and in fact it did take years, it has taken years to achieve some amazing things in the Our Grades Not Visas campaign.

So moving on from what can lawyers do? I guess I want to ask a much broader question and very much a forward looking question which is what looks like justice to you for your community?

Dr. Pinar Aksu

It’s a difficult question I think and it depends again how we understand justice. It could mean that somebody is campaigning for something or somebody wants something and then how do we achieve that and what’s the most best outcome for people? For me is I guess justice within the migration. Especially when you look at how there are so many violent policies being implemented on people and is for people to just live a normal life. I would say for me that would be justice for people to just be treated as a human being and to live a normal life where they don’t have to go through many hurdles to prove themselves of who they are, where they don’t have to continuously go to give evidence at the Home Office or where they don’t have to continuously, you know, fight for their rights and within society and live with long term difference that’s been created in communities. 

Yeah. I think just being treated as a human being and to have a normal life, that for me would be justice and also to seen as equal. I think that’s the most important thing. A lot of this time we talk about labels within migration, how everyone is given different labels, whether you’re asylum seeker, refugee, migrant, you know, client service user. There are so many different labels people are given throughout their journey of migration, whether that’s when they first arrive or after they get their refugee status as well. And you get given that labels within the law, but by society as well. And I think people just want to get rid of that and just live a normal life. Even when you’ve been in the country for so long, then you’re seen as different or you’re not from here. and you have to live with that label of facing daily racism or discrimination. And I think that’s tiring for people to continue to prove themselves who they are. Like they deserve to be here. And that’s. Yeah, for me, that’s just not just. And if people were treated equally, it will solve a lot of the problems we have, in society, I think.

Jen Ang

Thank you very much. You put that so simply. It’s also such a beautiful vision, actually. when you say it, I mean, I’m fully on board and I also appreciate, because of the reasons you’ve outlined, that there are many, many more steps to take before we achieve that equality for migrants in Scotland. But thank you for that.

So we’re on to our final, final question, which is this. So there will be some listeners out there today who are rightly blown away by the work that you’ve done and they may be thinking about a career or voluntary work in migration justice, or maybe learning more about your Active Inquiry work in Theatre of the Oppressed. And so the question is, what would you say to, your younger self, or someone who admires what you’ve accomplished today and maybe wants to be you? What would your advice be to someone who’s listening in that position?

Dr. Pinar Aksu

Yeah, So I should probably say, advice that is more positive, right? Because my advice would be, don’t do it. Have a peaceful life, I don’t know, go into farming, raise some chickens.

Jen Ang

I’ve been very clear with my children that they should probably not be lawyers.

Dr. Pinar Aksu

See?

Jen Ang

Exactly.

Dr. Pinar Aksu

It’s a difficult one because, it depends on your experience. I don’t think I just had a vision of, oh, should be in this sector of, whether to start as a Campaigner and then to be embedded in so much of the kind of community work and the policy work of the, of the area. 

But generally people, you know, if people do want to be involved in the migration sector they, they should be involved with a vision of bringing compassion and care and I guess the justice side of element of the work as well. and where the get, they are involved in a sense to remember that why it’s important to have welcoming communities, why it’s important that we should stand up for what is not right. 

So whether that’s the the racist immigration policies that’s being imposed, imposed on people or whether that’s the hostility that we experience in the communities and I think people should be reminded of okay, this is what we should do, we should be standing up for these these inequalities. And that’s what happened in Scotland, you know, when, in 2021, in May, when the people of Glasgow came out at Kenmure street and said these are our neighbours, they belong in the community. At the same time, we had in 2020 the Park Inn incident when somebody lost their life at the hotel accommodation.

And sometimes there are victories where the community wins when they come together and they challenge the hostile environment, the policies and the hostility. But then we have realities of the impact, the real impact of these violent laws I would say and implementations like at the parking incident. And then now we have increase in the far right and the impact is going to have in communities at a long term level. So whether that’s going to be this year, the following year, these divisions is going to be witnessed at a great level. and I think this is, this impacts all of us. So and this is why people should maybe choose the powerful standing up for what is right together with different campaigners and allies. And I think that’s one of the key elements when we do the campaigning and advocacy and people should remember the new generation I’m considering as older generation for myself but the new people who are maybe going into activism or want to campaign on equality, equalities is the importance of allies where you connect different causes together. 

And we highlight that this is not just an issue for the migration sector, for the refugee organisations, this is an issue for all of us. So bringing the trade unions on board, bringing different movements, whether that’s on migration, right, climate change or any different areas, to remember that this policies impact all of us for a long term. And I think that’s something that should be kept in mind.

I was very lucky that when I was first involved in activism, I called them elders, people who had so much experience and, people who were already campaigning, let’s say, in the 70s, 80s, and I had learned so much from them, where they showed me meaning of solidarity, what that means, meaning of comrades, meaning of working together and campaigning together, where we didn’t label, or you’re like, you’re a refugee, asylum seeker, or you’re this, that. But where we said, okay, we’re comrades, we’re working on this together, we’re campaigning on this together. 

And, this is just not fair and we must do something about it. And I think people should keep that in, in their mind if they’re interested in this. And I, again, very lucky that I had people like that around me, who guided me, who seen me as their peers, not as somebody with a label, but somebody that we can walk the walk rather than give me different roles. And I think we just need to remind ourselves that’s important. The ally, working together, but also working together creatively. 

And that’s something I try to do in, whether in campaigning or raising awareness or within my work, is to use the creative element. Because sometimes it becomes too boring when you have a policy paper or when you present something at a conference by saying, oh, and this is what ABC says. But if you do that creatively, you’re actually reaching to more audiences and you’re enabling more conversation and more critical conversation rather than, yeah, maybe reading a piece of policy or a paper. And I think we need to do more of that within the campaigning, but within communities, wherever, whatever the message that we’re trying to share. So if it’s on migration, we need to do that, engage with the communities more creatively and use that area as well.

Jen Ang

Gosh, it took me a long time to get this podcast episode to you, and in that time the political environment has shifted on again in Scotland in significant ways. I asked Pinar if she had anything to add in light of the recent Scottish elections and the challenges facing the new Parliament as Scottish MSPs return to Holyrood this week to take up their offices.

Dr Pinar Aksu

I think it’s been some journey and, we did not expect about 17 reform MSPs to be elected. This has been shown across the country as well. We’ve seen the election results in England and in Wales. There’s a change in the political system and I think we are also witnessing this in Scotland. I think there’s going to be lots more to do as activists, whether you’re working in migration on Equalities or in housing, in any spectrum of human rights. I think we’ve got lots to do in terms of challenging the negative narratives from the Reform Party. 

And what makes me sad is the fact that we have, Reform MSPs within our parliament, and having known their track record of their using languages around migration and people seeking asylum and refuge, I am hoping that such narratives will not be normalised within our Parliament, in the Scottish Parliament, and that we will not normalise hate and, racism. And unfortunately, these are the things that the Reform are doing is creating a hostile environment where they are being very vicious with their policies, but as well as their words, and for me, words matter. 

And I think the minute we start to use terms such as illegal migrants, illegal migration, this has a significant impact on the community. So I really hope we’ll not normalise this within our Parliament and in terms of communities. We have the local council elections next year in 2027, and I think we need to do more. We need to really listen to people and understand that we had years of austerity, we had funding cuts in our communities, we had issues around housing, we had issues around violence against women, and girls. And we need to talk with the communities and try to understand where these fears are coming from and listen to one another and try to look at where the root causes of such problems are. And I think this could only be done by compassion, by care and, by listening to one another, because if we don’t, then the result will be we will have more reform being elected. And I think that’s not what we want and that’s not who we are as a country and in Scotland. So let’s be more active, let’s start planning in our communities. Let’s do this by listening to one another, creating spaces where we can have critical and difficult conversations. And I think that is extremely important that we have such difficult and critical conversations so that we can understand where the anger and the fears are coming from. So, yeah, let’s see what happens in the communities. I’m sure compassion will win over hostility.

Jen Ang

Thank you so much, Pinar, for those closing thoughts about where we are today after the 2026 Scottish elections. If I may, I have one more question: So towards the end of the podcast, I always offer people an opportunity to explore, maybe organisations or campaigns that they didn’t know about, and I also encourage them to take action. Are there any organisations or places that you would give a shout out to that people should be looking at?

Dr Pinar Aksu

Yes, I mean, there are so many amazing groups local groups, national groups who try to do work on raising awareness about that direct solidarity as well. I mean, I would like to give a shout out to, our group, which is Refugees for Justice, where we’ve been advocating to end hotel accommodation in Scotland and look at alternative ways of housing people seeking asylum and refuge. 

And together with the lawyers, we have the fatal accident inquiry into the death of the. So having solidarity at the hearings and solidarity for Bedreddin’s family, but also people who are in hotel accommodations is very much important. And I guess shout, out to all the local groups across Scotland who are currently working under such hostile moments, especially groups in Falkirk like FOSS, groups in East Kilbride, which is EKIN, who are the East Kilbride Integration Network, people in Perth, Perth Against Racism in Aberdeen, the GREC, which is the Grampian Regional Equalities Council, and all the anti racism work that’s being done in the communities. 

And maybe one final shout out to the amazing toolkit around Anti Raid’s work, as well as toolkit into asylum system of Right to Remain and obviously to Scottish Refugee Council for all the solidarity work they do. So the list could go on, but I would say maybe these are some of the groups that we can keep an eye on, and also support one another not just by donating, but being physically there at protests and when needed, because that’s what we need more than ever.

Jen Ang

Thank you so much again, Pinar, for your time. We appreciate it.

And that’s a wrap. Thank you, our lovely listeners, for joining us for yet another episode of the Lawmanity podcast. If you wanted to learn more about some of the campaigns that Pinar has mentioned, we’ll put those in the show notes. And for those of you legal beagles, out there who are intrigued by the idea of community lawyering, we’ll share some resources for learning more about that too.

Our next episode is a special edition on disability rights, featuring Louise Whitfield, Legal Director of Liberty, as well as Heather Fiskin, Chief Executive Officer of Inclusion Scotland, and Tressa Burke, Chief Executive Officer, Glasgow Disability Alliance. Join us to listen to a fearless and fierce conversation about the state of disabled people’s rights in the uk, the role of strategic litigation in pressing for change and what more needs to be done for rights on paper to be realised in the lives of disabled people today. 

If you love today’s episode, please do hit the like and subscribe buttons and share our episodes with friends and colleagues who might also enjoy learning a little bit about how law really works in practise and how it can be used to make the world a better, brighter place. 

The Lawmanity podcast is co produced by me, your host Jen Ang and by the brilliant and talented Natalia Uribe. Shout out to Halina Refai for mentoring us through this first year of this incredible project and thanks also to Amanda Amaeshi on graphics and socials. The music you’ve been listening to is always on the move by Musicians in Exile, a Glasgow based music project led by people seeking refuge in Scotland. Thanks so much for tuning in today. 

We hope you enjoyed listening and see you next time.

Additional resources for this episode are linked below:

Learn More

• Listen to Lawmanity podcast episode “Breaking Barriers: Access to Education for Young Migrants, with Andy Sirel”: podfollow.com/lawmanity/view
• Read “Our Grades Not Visas: How community lawyering brought education justice for young migrant and refugee people in Scotland”: https://www.justrightscotland.org.uk/2025/10/our-grades-not-visas-how-community-lawyering-brought-education-justice-for-young-migrant-and-refugee-people-in-scotland/
• Read “Jo Wilding chronicles deepening immigration and asylum legal aid crisis, with failure to recruit staff an ‘existential threat’ to the sector” https://www.ein.org.uk/news/jo-wilding-chronicles-deepening-immigration-and-asylum-legal-aid-crisis-failure-recruit-staff
• Read “Scotland adopts a more inclusive franchise”:  https://globalcit.eu/scotland-adopts-a-more-inclusive-franchise/
• Read “Can a Student visa holder sit as a member of the Scottish Parliament? Yes, they can”: https://freemovement.org.uk/student-visa-member-of-scottish-parliament/
• Check out “#LiftTheBan: Give People Seeking Asylum the Right to Work”: https://www.refugee-action.org.uk/lift-the-ban/
• Check out Refugees for Justice: https://www.refugeesforjustice.org.uk/
• Check out Sistren Legal Collective: https://sistren.co.uk/community-lawyering/

Take Action

• Maryhill Integration Network: https://maryhillintegration.org.uk/get-involved/
• Govan Community Project: https://govancommunityproject.org.uk/get-involved/
• Community Infosource: https://www.infosource.org.uk/get-involved.html
• Refuweegee: https://www.refuweegee.co.uk/copy-of-about
• Scottish Detainees Visitors: https://sdv.org.uk/join-us
• The Welcoming (Edinburgh): https://www.thewelcoming.org/get-involved-the-welcoming-edinburgh/

Host: Jen Ang

Quote: Lily Greenan

“I think that we’ve had a significant amount of success in Scotland in shifting the legal frameworks. I’m not sure that that has actually had as much impact on the lives of women and girls as we would like to think.“

Jen Ang

Welcome to the Lawmanity podcast where we explore the complex relationship between law and activism and discuss the different ways that law can oppress people but can also lead to real social change. I’m Jen Ang, a human rights lawyer and activist based in Scotland and your host on the Lawmanity podcast.

This week, we’re speaking to activist and legend Lily Greenan. Lily has been involved in work that challenges and seeks to eliminate violence against women and girls since the early 1980s, as an activist, an advocate, and in strategic leadership roles, including serving as chief executive of Scottish Women’s Aid for nine years. 

Since 2015, Lily has been a freelance consultant, researcher, and a trainer with a focus on gender equality and violence against women and girls. And she shares with us here some reflections on using the law to push for progress in her time, including the genesis of the groundbreaking Domestic Abuse Scotland Act 2018. 

Lily also brings considerable experience and wisdom as an LGBT activist in the late 1980s, when she campaigned with others against the Conservative Government’s notorious Section 28 law, which prohibited talking about queer lives and identities in schools. 

I so enjoyed my conversation with Lily. It was warm, thought provoking, and wise, just like the legend herself. I hope you do too. 

Welcome to the show, Lily, and I’m so delighted to be speaking to you.

Lily Greenan

Thanks, Jen. Legend feels a little bit daunting! but I’m really looking forward to the conversation. I think that what you’re doing is really interesting, and I’m very happy to be part of it. Thank you for inviting me.

Jen Ang

That’s very kind, Lily. I think it’s appropriate in the circumstances. 

So, just to get started in this podcast, I’ve been experimenting with a surprise opener question to get us settled and to learn a little bit more about the people, behind the activist legends we’re interviewing. A good friend of mine pointed out that our sense of smell is our oldest sense and observed that we can hold deep connections between the sense of smell and other memories. 

So, if you don’t mind, would you be willing to tell me about a smell that’s meaningful to you? Maybe one that’s connected to a place or a time that you like to bring to mind?

Lily Greenan

I read the briefing note for this and saw the little prompt that you were going to ask about smells. What immediately came to mind was the smell of za’atar which is a spice that is used in Middle Eastern, and Palestinian in particular, cooking. And I had used it before this visit that I’m going to mention. But now what it brings back is the Old City of Jerusalem, because I was very privileged to be part of a choir that went to Palestine in 2017 to sing in solidarity with people there and the spice market in the Old City, it literally blew my mind. And the overwhelming smell that has, stayed with me, it was the smell of the za’atar spice, which is a mix of thyme and salt and sesame and sumac and just an incredible blend of stuff that both tastes delicious and has a really powerful smell. Not powerful in a bad way, just it stays days. And if I pass a shop that sells it, I smell it. So. and it’s been much on my mind recently because of what’s happening in Palestine, and it’s just special. So a heart smell for me.

Jen Ang

Thank you so much for sharing that. And actually, when you share that, I actually think a little bit about za’atar in my life as well. And at our family’s table, you probably don’t know this, but for many years my parents lived and worked in the Middle East and we had been given a gift of za’atar from some family friends that we would serve the kids with olive oil and bread sometimes. So even though my kids grew up here in Scotland, they grew up with that taste. And they sometimes ask for it, like they expect that to be part of our table, which I think is a really nice expression as well of how gifts of food and memories travel, travel to other places. So thank you for sharing that. 

And now that we’re a bit settled, we move from that to really quite a huge question. So my first question for you: throughout your career in your work, do you feel that the law works equally for you or for your community, however you define that, whether that is the people you work with or for and why or why not?

Lily Greenan

Who, huh? Does it? Yeah. No, it doesn’t. 

It doesn’t in two senses. One, my work has focused on violence against women. And particularly in the first few years, I was focused on rape and sexual assault and the legal response to those assaults and women’s experiences of the legal system, of the justice system. And then laterally, I worked with Scottish Women’s Aid and that had done sort of a few years before that in an NHS-based project which brought us into contact with legal responses to all forms of gender-based violence. And it just fails over and over and over again. Some of it is in the framing of the law itself, like how the law is framed and who it serves. Some of it is in process. You know, like, sometimes the framing shifts, the legislation moves on, but the way in which it is implemented doesn’t because the system is still rooted in where it was 40 years ago. So that there is that area, which is work where I feel like the community I work with and that I’m part of as a woman is not well served by the law in relation to assaults against our person. 

The other community that I identify with is the LGBT community. I’m a lesbian and I was active in the late 80s in the campaign against clause 28. Where a Conservative Government, didn’t actively try to criminalise homosexuality, but made it unlawful to talk about it in schools, particularly in schools. Their focus was education and it was a sideways way of marginalising a community that was already pretty marginalised, but at least had achieved some legal recognition, as in not any longer being criminalised from 1967 onwards. And that, I remember the day that I heard that they were trying to introduce, via an amendment to a Miscellaneous Provisions Act – you know, like, it wasn’t a specific, “we’re going to go for the gays” act, it was an addition to a local government reform Act – and it just, it was headed in there and a few of us got together in a cafe that had not long opened in Edinburgh, which was the Blue Moon Cafe, which became the locus for the campaign. We called ourselves the Scottish Homosexual Action Group. There was at the time, ah, and the acronym was deliberate! There was at the time a well-established group, the Scottish Homosexual Rights Group, which had previously been the Scottish Minorities Group based in Broughton Street. And the cafe was in that premises. And so we became an activist group. We were mixed: lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans. The terminology was different in 1988 and the goal we set was to have a party in Princes Street. We basically decided we would try and get a picnic at the Ross Bandstand. So the law was definitely working against us. The local council leaders were open to having a conversation with us. And what happened in the end was they both gave us the use of the bandstand, which was council owned, and a small grant just before the law got royal assent.

Jen Ang

Wow.

Lily Greenan

And then we had the party, the picnic in the park, the Lark in the Park, almost immediately after Royal Assent was given. It was the first public LGBT event to happen after that piece of legislation came into force. And on the way I learned a lot about what the law did or did not do in relation to supporting people’s rights. We were allowed to do that picnic in the park because elected representatives and officials who understood how to bend things, I would say, said, “yeah, okay, we’re going to see what we can do here”. And they did it by making sure that we got our application in so that we were able to process the whole thing before the law was enacted. I think it had been passed but assent hadn’t been given at the point where the council said, yeah, we’re doing it. But I remember also in that time trying to unravel a banner, along the side of Arthur’s Seat, halfway up it, that just said lesbian and gay rights are human rights. And being hauled down by the Holyrood park police because it’s crown property and you’re not allowed to do politics on crown property. And I thought, okay, so, you know, it was actually the only time we were actively stopped from doing something. They made us get off Arthur’s Seat, they confiscated the banner, which was really annoying. Nobody was arrested. You know, it was a fairly low-key event. But yeah, there was just a lot of recognition that, even though there was more acceptance of lesbian, gay, bi and trans identities – I wouldn’t say bi and trans, bisexuals were almost invisible at that time as a group, and then trans people were hidden, very hidden. 

But yeah, there’s something about the realisation that I actually was in very much not liked by the law minority, where as a woman working on violence against women issues, I was using advocacy as a tool. So it wasn’t on the streets activism for me. I got involved in legal campaigning very early in my time at Rape Crisis. I started there in 1981 in Edinburgh. And Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre had quite an active profile as a legal campaigning organisation, because Aileen Christianson, bless her, was committed to doing legal reform and just stuck with it. And we had lawyers and trainee lawyers in the collective in those early days. So it was well informed strategy, I would say. But there was at least a recognition in general and in law that rape and sexual assault were wrong. Discriminating against gay people was not considered to be wrong. There wasn’t a lot of public sympathy for our campaign against that, legal clause that was being introduced. And it has shifted. We’re in a different place now. The fights are different, the allies are different, there are different issues. On violence against women across the board, I think that we’ve had a significant amount of success in Scotland in shifting the legal frameworks. I’m not sure that that has actually had as much impact on the lives of women and girls as we would like to think. The processes, from all that I have read recently, there have been a number of projects that have looked at women’s experiences going through court processes. The processes are as grim now as they were when I first started. Somewhere in the mid-80s, I was one of the research assistants. I wouldn’t even call me a research assistant. There was a group of us who got involved in sitting in courts doing verbatim transcripts for the piece of research into the sexual history and sexual character evidence. It was a section introduced into law that limited the introduction, or was supposed to limit the introduction, of sexual history and sexual character evidence in relation to women complainers of sexual assault and put in place an application process. So either defence or prosecution were supposed to make an application to the judge or sheriff to introduce such evidence and justify why it was reasonable to do so. And the research was conducted by Beverly Brown, Lynne Jamison and Michelle Berman. And it was looking at how far has the application been successful in terms of limiting the unapproved introduction of such evidence. So I sat in courtrooms and I wrote down every word I heard. Like we were doing, this is in the days before laptops and digital transcription and stuff like that. We literally, we hand wrote on full scan, wow. Everything that we could get down that was said and noted. We were looking as well at the non verbals and behaviours of the personnel involved and any observations we had about the environment, about how the woman was treated. And it was just really clear all the way through that women were not equal citizens, didn’t have the same rights as the accused. The accused was protected, innocent till proven guilty, didn’t have to stand up and say anything. There was a presumption that the complainer had to give evidence. If they didn’t, they were uncooperative. And that they could be subjected to any range of questions about any aspect of their lives and their relationship with the accused and what they’d been doing before, what they did after, who they spoke to, whether they’d been drinking, what they’d been wearing, what their underwear looked like. They were all considered valid questions and they still are. 

So, no, I don’t think that the law has served us well. Both of my communities are still struggling with legal recognition, legal rights and legal status. You know, like they’re both of the communities that I identify with, their clear human rights breaches. So, yeah, I don’t think that we’re very well served still. 

Jen Ang

Thank you for such a rich explanation and also one that highlights, I mean, there’s so much I could say, I’m not going to say a lot, in order to bring us on to the next point. 

But first of all, the points that you make about the experience of women, complainers of violence, sexual violence in the courts, are still front and centre, the issues that activists and campaigners are raising today. And also, I find it really interesting and so thought-provoking, actually, some of the tactics that you talk about in campaigning and activism. So courtroom attendance projects, which are still a really good way to get work done but also bringing humour and joy to public protest. I feel like we could do a little more of that, actually. I feel like we should bring back a little bit of that resistance magic, because I think the way that you describe some of the public action around, advancing LGBT rights in earlier decades was an acknowledgement that there is a point to trying things or making a visible statement, even in the face of total lack of public support and, legal discrimination. So I’m just going to store that one away as a useful reminder. 

So, coming on to the number of different ways that activist campaigners seek to change the law or challenge it, or simply just highlight inequality, I wanted to ask another big question, and that is, do you see the law as a barrier or a tool in the struggle to achieve equality for people who are marginalised and disadvantaged?

Lily Greenan

I’d say it depends on what you’re actually trying to achieve. If you want to dismantle the patriarchy, it ain’t the way to go. Yeah, okay. It just isn’t, you know, like, it’s, to use language that feels a wee bit dated, maybe, but maybe isn’t, or the understanding of it: it’s a liberal route in the sense it’s rather than a radical route. 

Like that whole thing of working within the system. It’s what I’ve always done. You know, I trained police officers. You know, like, I was keen to get involved in that work because I thought it was important to work with the people who were doing the work. And that we couldn’t change anything unless we understood how police officers thought about the women that they were interviewing. This is back in the early 80s. So I started doing that from about 1983, 84, and, you know, alongside a more experienced rape crisis collective member, and then began to do them later and I carried on doing those for quite a long time. And we called them police training. It was police talks. We called them the talks, the police talks. And we got 45 minutes to speak to probationers who were on a two-year probation course entering into the police force. Lothian and Borders. This was pre–Police Scotland, so like seven or eight regional police forces. So I did police probationers, sergeants, refresher courses for sergeants which were always hard work, and occasionally inspectors. But the probationer training was seen as the, we need to get at them while they’re still in training. But we got 45 minutes out of a two-year probation training and we shared the space that, the afternoon space usually that they gave us, with Women’s Aid and Victim Support. So each of those three organisations got 45 minutes to say this is what we do and this is what you need to be aware of when you’re working with this group of people. And it’s different now. Again there’s been a shift in the way that they carry out the training and there’s more in-depth training across the board. Because it’s a large workforce, the police have actually got pretty good at doing, we need this group of people to have in depth training on this issue. Everyone has to have the basic. This group has to have more in-depth, this small group of specialists who will be the go-to if we need something extra. And ah, that is echoed in other public sector, in other justice organisations. I think the fiscal, the Crown Office does a similar thing, possibly, the health service does it, but a generalist approach. For most staff it was domestic abuse. I’m not sure if they’ve broadened it to all forms of violence against women. 

So going back to the justice system, back to the legal system, I’ve worked within, I’ve worked with lawyers, I’ve done advocacy work trying to change the law and I’ve done a lot of backroom work. And it can be very effective if you understand that your goal is to improve this situation for this relatively small number of women. So, this is just about improving the response to women who experience domestic abuse and gets reported and they go to court. It does not change the context, you know, like within which that abuse has happened. It doesn’t challenge or change the societal context. I’m not sure everyone would agree with me on that around some things.

Jen Ang

It’s definitely okay for people not to agree with you. This is what you think. 

So can I ask, for example, just to draw that out a little bit so there you’re referring to the work that you and others did around the Domestic Abuse Scotland Act. So when you say it was worth putting in that effort because it changed some things for some people. But, again, thinking about the law as a tool for change, you have to recognise that, only addresses part of the problem and not actually other things that you still have your eye on, that we all have our eye on, actually. 

That’s interesting and I guess that leads nicely on because you’ve spoken about working with lawyers, you’ve spoken about also scrutinising the justice system as a court observer and without doubt have worked closely with people throughout their lives engaging with the justice system. So this question is for you, what’s the role of lawyers and the legal system in relation to social justice movements? And I always kind of remind people here what I remember, which is that we’re not just talking about maybe community lawyers or people who are working alongside civil society, but obviously government and prosecutorial service and judges. They are all also lawyers. People who drafted unhelpful laws or enforced them also are lawyers. So for you, what’s the role of lawyers in relation to social justice?

Lily Greenan

I think they can be great proponents for it or enemies of it. I don’t think it’s a straight either, I mean, it’s not straightforward. I think there are people who without a doubt go into law, become lawyers and judges who move through the legal profession, who work in different roles in the legal profession, who carry with them a commitment to social justice, to improving society for everybody. And there are also people who go into it, who are in it to, uphold the status quo and for whom it isn’t the question of balancing rights or levelling the playing field or lifting up people who have been oppressed. It’s not about that for those folk. It’s, this is working fine for me. Let’s just keep it that way. And I think those lawyers and judges are human beings and we can be right-wing, left-wing, sit in the middle, never think about politics too. And they also that range of potential profile. I know some fantastic human rights lawyers. You’re one of them who have done really brilliant work. And I’ve known some wonderful sheriffs and judges that I really rate in terms of how they tried to ensure that there was balance and scrutiny. But I have also known some not so nice people.

Jen Ang

Nicely and characteristically put. Anyway, we’ll move on to the penultimate question, which is a nice one actually, and that is taking in everything that you’ve said and you have really taken a long view across your activism. What does justice look like for you and for the communities that you serve or feel a part of?

Lily Greenan

I’m not sure if I know anymore. If I think just about women going through court processes, women who’ve been abused, whether by partners or by other, and being heard, being respected, having your experience validated. It’s not always just about the result, the verdict. I think that the process plays a significant part in how women feel about whether justice was served. And the verdict, without a doubt, you know, is part of it. But I think there is also something about just being treated like a human being from the beginning of the process. And, that’s difficult in an adversarial system. You know, the system is adversarial right from the start. When the police get involved, they’re probing, they’re looking at what did you do to provoke it? What was your part? That is the implication is what did you do to make this happen? Those are bigger issues than the justice system. Those are about how society at large sees gender roles, the place of women, the place of men, the place of people who don’t identify as either of those things. I used to believe that the law could change the world. That if we got the laws right, it didn’t do it on its own… And I think there is something in it. If you have legal recognition for something that is criminal or that your existence is valid, you know, whichever of those that, you know, like we’re thinking two different areas of law here, then that begins to shift public discourse, public recognition, public acknowledgement. It’s a very long-term process. And I did used to have more faith that it could work like that, that if we focused on transforming the legislative framework around whichever issue, that it would feed into a wider understanding and acceptance and, and recognition. 

But I think now we need something different. We’re up against really big challenges and just focusing on the law in isolation doesn’t do it anymore for me. Which is not to say that I regret any of the work done or think that it was a waste of time, because it wasn’t. You mentioned the Domestic Abuse Scotland Act, when I went into Scottish Women’s Aid, at the start, the position was that domestic abuse was usually prosecuted in a summary court. So a sheriff sitting without a jury because the offences were seen as minor, it was incident-based. So it was all about that incident on that occasion, you know, like that slap, that kick, that punch, that beating. The role of psychological and emotional abuse didn’t really come into it and all the other behaviours that are now recognised and categorised, thanks to dear Evan Stark, as coercive control didn’t exist in the legal framework. And we had spent years saying domestic abuse is not about one incident. It’s years and years long experience daily of being undermined and belittled and in many different ways abused and isolated. And anyone working with, with women who’d lived that, understood that but the legal system acted as if that was nothing, that didn’t exist. And then Bill Walker happened. Bill Walker was the SNP MSP who was charged and prosecuted and ultimately convicted of domestic abuse against three ex-partners, three ex-wives and a stepdaughter. And it attracted a huge amount of media attention and public attention because he was a politician. Even though he was dropped from the SNP immediately when he was arrested, he was a sitting politician, it became clear that because he was being prosecuted in a sheriff court, in a summary court, sheriff court, he couldn’t be made to leave his role as a politician. He couldn’t be kicked out of Parliament because he was only going to be sentenced to a maximum of one year because it was a sheriff summary.

And I was at that time the chief exec of Scottish Women’s Aid. And I was in and like there were phone calls from journalists like for days saying how is this possible? Like Catherine Mackie, the sheriff, read out the list of things he had done in her summing up, I think there were a couple of assaults. There were assaults but a lot of the behaviours were extreme control and manipulation of those women’s lives. And the journalist question was always the same. It was like, how is this possible? He’s been at this for 30 years and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah blah. And see, because like this is what happens. Domestic abuse gets prosecuted in a lower court because it’s seen as a minor offence. And yeah, he hit them and he hurt them, but there were no fractures, there were no broken bones, there was no blood, there were no lacerations. So it’s considered to be a minor offence, and they were horrified and it gave us a space for action, you know, like we went, well, like it’s shitty, this is awful, but what do we do here? And what we did was convene a Chatham House Rules roundtable, which you will not know about because it was Chatham House. The fact that we had it is not a secret, who was at it and what we talked about isn’t for disclosure. But what we did was I sat down with Louise Johnson who was the legal issues worker and said, right, who do we need in the room? We want to have a conversation about how we change this, how do we change the way that domestic abuse is prosecuted? How do we use this moment to move away from an incident-based approach? Is there a way to do it? Is it a new law that’s needed? Is it a different way of prosecuting? What is it that we need? And we had domestic abuse courts already there were specialist court approaches that helped. So, yeah, we had a meeting. We had representation from the Crown Office and Fiscal Service, we had representation from the Faculty of Advocates, from the Scottish Government Policy Unit, we had the Law Society, we had Judicial Studies Institute. We hauled in everybody we could think of. We invited everyone that might be interested in having a conversation. And the hook was Evan Stark had just arrived to do a three-month fellowship at the Centre for Research and Families and Relationships. And Evan wrote the book on coercive control. And I would always have been the first to say I didn’t invent the concept. I gave it a name and he wrote about it. And he had just arrived and we invited them to a roundtable with Evan Stark to talk about how we could move the needle, so to speak, and really think about a different way to treat domestic abuse within the legal system itself, Police Scotland were there. We had everyone who had a role at a strategic level in relation to. And we just opened the space and we said, there’s no notes, there’s no minutes. We’re not publicising this. We didn’t tell the media we were doing it. We just had a very open and frank conversation and then went on you go. And sometime after that, I think six months later, the Solicitor General made a statement that she would not be opposed to the idea of a specific offence.

Jen Ang

Amazing. Wow.

Lily Greenan

At the COPFS annual conference. And then the policy people got involved and then the drafting process started and I wasn’t there for most of the drafting process. Marsha Scott came in to the role when I left and, you know, she led the organisation through that bit of the process. But I think about the bits that just came together and sometimes it’s that, you know, like, in terms of the, how can you use the law? Sometimes you just, you get an opportunity that you can take advantage of and really push for stuff.

Jen Ang

Thank you so much for outlining that history, which is fascinating and as you said, you know, some of which I did not know. There’s so many timely lessons, for the work that continues across activism in Scotland. But something very relevant and recent is work that’s being led to decriminalise abortion in Scotland. You’ll know that there was recently a vote in England. And one of the things that I think the campaign is mulling over is what are effective ways to engage lawyers, and the legal system as well as the judiciary in a conversation about where Scots Law sits on this issue. 

I like, again, that reminder, that big questions, that we’ve had convenings in the past, where big questions are asked and where you can have frank conversation. I never expected to find that in this conversation today, but that’s something that I’m definitely going to take away. 

So the last question is, there will be people out there listening to this series of podcasts who are really interested in activism, maybe how the law fits into activism. And they will be looking at who you are and what you have accomplished in your career. And they may be in awe, they will be in awe and they may actually even want to be you. Like, they’ll wonder how you got there. I mean, you know. So my question for you is, what advice would you have for someone out there, who might be a younger version of you, or if you prefer, what advice do you have for your younger self?

Lily Greenan

I think advice from my younger self would be: be less afraid. Yeah, I was anxious 20-year-old, for lots of reasons. And since then… I didn’t grow up in a religious household, but I heard someone who was Quaker talking about the feeling of being moved to speak in worship, in a meeting for worship, which is a silent meeting unless someone feels moved to speak. And someone who I knew well described it. And I thought: oh, I, I know that feeling. 

And it’s that I was anxious and worried about doing the wrong thing in whatever context, socially and academically and like whatever, I worried about doing things wrong. And I would still be a bit plagued by that after I got involved with Rape Crisis, and other sort of bits of activism. So what would happen is that I would be really wound up, really anxious and then I would just have to speak. And my back used to spasm. It was that extreme. Like I would stand up and speak and when I sat down my back would be in spasm because I was so wound up. 

And I think I would love it if younger people coming into this kind of work, could learn ways to be more relaxed about it, because it really wasn’t that big a deal, most of the time. I think it held me back from doing maybe more than I did and, you know, and I got past it, but it took a while. 

And the other is write stuff down. I’m sitting in my attic office at home, looking at the archive boxes that I have to sort. I’ve been keeping… I wouldn’t call it a diary – I keep notes at meetings, I take notes at meetings. It’s partly because I’ve always had a bit of a shit memory, so I needed to be able to remind myself what. And what I have realised over the last few years is that I can go back and find the notes from that meeting in 2010 and, you know, something will happen. It allows me to connect the dots. If I need to, I can go back and check, you know, like, that’s there. I don’t know what I’m going to do with them because there’s quite a lot of notebooks. But they’re a useful personal archive and a resource about how the different areas of the work connect up. Because they’re not just about, they’re not just notes I took in meetings I was being paid to attend. I’ve been doing it, you know, sort of since the early 80s. And, yeah, or find, find some way to, to document what you’re doing and to be able to go back now and again and remind yourself that you’ve learned a few things since then. And that you maybe wouldn’t approach the problem in quite that way now. But also there’s some good ideas in there that you forget because you move on and you do other things. So there’s something that I would encourage people to document and not just for ourselves. 

There are areas of our activist histories that are just not visible. The Scottish Homosexual Action Group, I went looking for some information about Lark in the Park and it’s attributed to the other more established group, as the group that organised it on Wikipedia, because the Scottish Homosexual Action Group wasn’t that organised with documenting. So I’m going to learn how to edit Wikipedia, so I can fix that because… you know, it’s a small thing, but I was like, they didn’t do it, we did that, you know. And I, thought, yeah, okay, it’s, it’s worth taking some notes and, for… well, for future generations as well, you know, there are libraries. 

I hope that we will always have libraries of some sort, and we need to be able to learn what worked and what didn’t work. So even if it’s not stuff that’s going to be published, being able to share it somehow, finding a way to share what you’ve done that worked that was successful, and what you did that just landed flat and left everyone feeling a bit yuck because activism, you mentioned joy earlier and yeah, the picnic in the park was all about… like we’re going to have a party, they’re telling us we’re not real, we’re going to have a party. And finding ways to hold on to those bits of joy and successes is worth it. Other people need to know.

Jen Ang

Thank you so much, Lily. I think that’s a brilliant way to end an essentially and joyfully Lily conversation, if I can put it that way. Be a bit brave, take a note for your own reflection, but actually as a contribution to, you know, a collective learning, which I think you still believe in, I can see over your shoulder.

Lily Greenan

I still believe.

Jen Ang

Yeah, I still believe. which is something I love about you. But that’s also why, well beyond when you had to, you continue to do this work. So thank you again for your time.

And that’s a wrap. Thank you, our lovely listeners, for joining us for another episode of the Lawmanity podcast. If you wanted to learn more about the definitive history of SHAG and the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act, we’re all going to have to wait until Lily gets around to writing that book and learning to edit Wikipedia. But meanwhile, we’ll put some links in the episode notes for you to explore. 

Want to take action? We’ve suggested this on the podcast before but consider volunteering at your local Women’s Aid. They have lots of different roles depending on your skills and how much time you might be able to offer. And we’re heading into Pride Month in June with no shortage of opportunities to help raise money, support projects and generally shout from the rooftops about the further changes that we still need to see in queer rights, and particularly trans rights from the incoming Scottish Parliament. 

Our next episode features migrant justice activist and theatre maker and researcher Dr. Pinar Aksu from the University of Glasgow, speaking about the many successful campaigns she has led for migrant rights, as well as why and how she uses art practices to explore access to justice and social change movement building. 

If you love today’s episode, please do hit the like and subscribe buttons and share our episodes with friends and colleagues who might also enjoy learning a little bit about how law really works in practice and how it can be used to make the world a better, brighter place. 

The Lawmanity podcast is co-produced by me, your host Jen Ang, and by the brilliant and talented Natalia Uribe. Shout out to Helena Refai for mentoring us through our first year of this incredible project. And thanks also to Amanda Amaeshi, on graphics and socials. The music you’ve been listening to is “Always On The Move” by Musicians in Exile, a Glasgow-based music project led by people seeking refuge in Scotland. Thanks so much for tuning in today. We hope you enjoyed listening and see you next time!

Additional resources for this episode are linked below: 

Learn More 

• About the Women’s Aid movement through the Speak Out project, hosted by Glasgow Women’s Library: featuring oral history clips of women connected to the movement 

• “Section 28, how it came and went”: A blog post on Section 28, the Scottish Homosexual Action Group (SHAG) and Lark in the Park, by the Equality Network: https://www.equality-network.org/our-work/history/section-28-how-it-came-and-went/ 

Take Action 

• Find your nearest Scottish Women’s Aid group 

• Find your nearest Pride 2026 event 

In a recent Lawmanity podcast episode, I highlighted that, too often, legal systems are shaped by fear – particularly during a global rollback of rights under pressure from far-right movements.  

Commitments to equality and justice can be weakened when they are deemed “politically inconvenient”, sidelined by partisan political calculation. Scotland is not immune from this. 

The newly formed Scottish Government and Parliament face a clear responsibility. This is not the moment for incrementalism or retreat, but for principled and sustained leadership: to challenge this rights backlash, and – more importantly – to strengthen the systems that allow people to seek justice and hold governments to account. 

Here are some key steps that should define that approach. 

Fund Access to Justice: Legal Aid Reform 

If access to justice is to be treated seriously, legal aid must be a central priority. 

Legal aid in Scotland, administered by the Scottish Legal Aid Board (SLAB), helps people pay for legal advice and representation when they cannot afford it themselves. It covers advice and assistance, civil and criminal cases, and children’s hearings, with eligibility determined by financial circumstances and the nature of the case. 

As recent University of Glasgow policy research notes: 

“Legal aid promotes access to justice for all, not just those who can afford it. It is a foundational tenet for realising the Vision for Justice in Scotland and a human-rights based approach more broadly. Without a well-functioning legal aid system, people are forced to represent themselves – risking unbalancing the equality of arms, or more likely, do not pursue a remedy, risking a rights violation going unaddressed.”  

There is broad agreement across academia, the legal profession, and civil society that the failure to address the legal aid crisis also puts the justice system – and those who work within in it – under significant strain. The 2025 Scottish Parliament inquiry into civil legal assistance identified an “urgent need” to improve access to justice, warning that people’s ability to exercise their legal rights is already being “severely compromised”. 

These systemic shortcomings are most evident in the emergence of “legal aid deserts” –in some parts of Scotland, people who are eligible for legal aid are unable to find a solicitor able to take on their casedue to a shortage of legal aid solicitors in their area. Survivors of domestic abuse, for example, may have to contact dozens of firms before securing representation. This reflects deeper structural pressures within the system: a shrinking provider base, increasing workloads, and growing concerns about the long-term sustainability of legal aid practice, with significant numbers of solicitors considering leaving the field altogether. 

Meaningful structural reforms and proper investment are needed, delivered through a new Legal Aid Bill. Reforms should include widening access to early and preventative legal advice, increasing financial eligibility thresholds for legal aid, and strengthening early intervention to prevent problems escalating into crisis. Legal aid rates and wider funding structures must also be reviewed in consultation with the profession to help rebuild the long-term sustainability of the sector. 

Legal aid is often discussed primarily in terms of cost – but the evidence increasingly points in a different direction: investment in legal aid can prevent wider social and economic harms, from homelessness to ill-health, reducing pressures elsewhere in the system. Even so, reform should not be justified solely on the basis of its economic benefits – more fundamentally, access to justice is an intrinsic component of a society where justice is not merely rhetoric but a lived reality. 

Safeguard Rights: The Scottish Human Rights Bill 

Another key priority is the long-awaited introduction of the Scottish Human Rights Bill; crucially, the rights it contains must be enforceable in practice. 

The proposed Scottish Human Rights Bill was intended to bring a range of international human rights treaties directly into Scots law, building on the earlier incorporation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). These included protections relating to economic and social rights, racial equality, women’s rights, disability rights, and the right to a healthy environment.  

During the previous parliamentary session, significant work was undertaken across government and civil society to develop the legislation – making the failure to introduce the Bill all the moredisappointing. 

In the words of the Health and Social Care Alliance Scotland (the ALLIANCE):  

“This was a missed opportunity to improve accountability and actionability for rights in Scotland, and to act on the evidence and experience shared by so many rights holders, human rights defenders, and organisations. […] The next Scottish Government must prioritise passing a Human Rights Bill, taking a maximalist approach to incorporation within the constraints of the devolution settlement.” 

But incorporation alone is not sufficient. Without accessible legal advice and mechanisms, effective routes to remedy, and properly resourced oversight bodies, there is a real risk of creating a new layer of legal promise without a practical route to justice. 

This is why access to justice must be built into the foundations of any future Human Rights Bill. The Civil Society Working Group on Incorporation has called for the legislation to include “the right to an effective remedy on the face of the legislation”, ensuring that rights are tangible rather than aspirational. The ALLIANCE has also emphasised the need to adequately resource the Scottish Human Rights Commission so that rights oversight and accountability mechanisms can operate effectively.And, as the Human Rights Consortium Scotland has highlighted: “Learning from and strengthening the implementation of the UNCRC Act provides a crucial blueprint for delivery of the Scottish Human Rights Bill.” 

Most people will never engage directly with constitutional litigation or specialist human rights arguments. Instead, they encounter the state through schools, housing, healthcare, social security, tribunals, complaints processes, and regulators.  

Any Human Rights Bill must therefore be designed around systems ordinary people can realistically navigate – with accessible information, independent advocacy, meaningful remedies, and institutions giving effect to rights in everyday life.  

Strengthen Accountability: Measuring Access to Justice 

Finally, an often overlooked but essential part of the access to justice puzzle is data. Access to justice cannot be strengthened effectively if government does not properly understand which groups are disproportionately excluded from it. Transparency, accountability, and robust evidence must therefore form part of any serious programme of reform. 

This requires more than headline statistics on court usage or legal aid expenditure. Government must be able to assess whether people can realistically access advice, remedies, representation, complaints systems, tribunals, and advocacy services when rights are breached. That means systematically gathering and analysing robust equality and human rights data to understand whose needs are being met – and whose are not. 

The ALLIANCE has highlighted the lack of accessible and comprehensive data across public services, warning that without meaningful monitoring, it becomes far harder to assess whether the governmentis fulfilling its human rights obligations. Similarly, the National Advisory Council on Women and Girls (NACWG) has stressed the importance of intersectional analysis and disaggregated data collection, emphasising that differing experiences based on overlapping factors such as gender, ethnicity, disability, income, age, and sexuality must be properly understood rather than treated as secondary considerations. NACWG has warned that progress on in this area remains inconsistent, overly dependent on individual initiative rather than a systematic approach. 

Without comprehensive data, systemic exclusion can remain hidden in plain sight. Measuring access to justice is therefore essential both for identifying where the system is failing and for shaping reforms that respond to the experiences of those most affected by inequality and exclusion. 

Conclusion 

At a time when rights protections are increasingly challenged internationally and political pressures can make justice appear “inconvenient”, there is a responsibility on both Government and Parliament not to retreat from these commitments, but to strengthen them. Rights must be enforceable and backed by institutions capable of delivering justice fairly and consistently. 

Ultimately, rights are only as meaningful as the systems that allow people to enforce them. The task facing Scotland is whether it is willing to build and sustain those systems over the course of this parliamentary term and beyond.  

Amanda Amaeshi is an award-winning activist, campaigner, and writer, specialising in gender equality, anti-racism, and youth voice and political participation. She is also a Legal Caseworker at Lawmanity.

Host: Jen Ang

Quote: Nani Jansen Reventlow 

“Being able to have this space to really explore some topics in depth kind of reignited that passion that I’d always had for writing. So it was a really nice way of reconnecting with that part of myself as well.”

Jen Ang 

Welcome everyone to the Lawmanity podcast where we explore the complex relationship between law and activism and discuss the different ways that law can oppress people but can also lead to real positive social change. I’m Jen Ang, a human rights lawyer and activist based in Scotland and your host on the Lawmanity podcast. 

This week, we’re speaking to activist and legend Nani Jansen Reventlow. Nani is an author and award-winning human rights lawyer specialised in strategic litigation at the intersection of human rights, social justice, and technology.  

She’s the founder of Systemic Justice, an organisation that seeks to radically transform how the law works for communities fighting for racial, social, and economic justice.  

She also has an extensive background promoting human rights in the digital context, and defending journalists and activists in some of the most repressive environments in the world. She previously founded and built the Digital Freedom Fund, which supports digital rights litigation.  

Now, Nani is also the author of Radical Justice, a collection of nine essays on how to build a better world, published in Dutch in 2024 and followed by an English edition recently published in March of this year.  

Today, we’re going to speak to Nani, both about her stunning career and the recent publication of the English edition of her book Radical Justice.  

Welcome to the show, Nani. 

Nani Jansen Reventlow 

Thanks so much for having me, Jen. 

Jen Ang 

Oh, I’m so pleased that you’ve made time to speak to us. I know that you’ve been really busy, both in your role at Systemic Justice but also touring the English edition of your book. So, thank you so much.  

So in this podcast, I’ve been experimenting with a surprise opener question to get us settled and to learn a little bit more about the people behind the legal legends who we’re interviewing. Now, a really good friend of mine pointed out that our sense of smell is our oldest sense and observed that we can hold deep connections between our sense of smell and our memories. So, if you don’t mind, can I ask you to tell us about a smell that’s meaningful to you, maybe something you really like, or something that’s connected to a place or time that you like to bring to mind? 

Nani Jansen Reventlow 

Oh, that’s such a good question. Yeah, I’m very conscious of the way that I kind of… the place that I give scent and smell in my life. I know that sounds perhaps a little bit strange, but I have a lot of things that I associate with different seasons and different settings and so on.  

And I think, uh, the one that I would pick here is actually a smell of my writing room. You can’t tell right now, but I’m behind my writing desk, which is in a room that’s adjacent to the garden in our house. And, um, there’s a really big cypress tree, actually when you look out of the window, that’s like a little bit behind me over there. So, and I have like these really nice scent sticks that are cypress scented and that I really associate with this room. 

So whenever I go in here, I’m like, oh, yeah, I kind of like go into that mindset and it’s very nice and kind of like a little bit fresh, but a little bit woody, kind of grounding scent. And yeah, I associate it with a very happy space and a very happy activity. 

Jen Ang 

Oh, thank you so much for sharing that. And how I’m not surprised in a way, because your writing is run through with actually a sense of centredness and groundedness. And I kind of love the idea that I will now think of you in your writing space with those scents around. How smart is well to have a peaceful space to write, because I certainly hope that you will be writing and speaking to us more over the years. So, thanks for sharing.  

I would love to turn to the title of your book now. So, you know, Radical Justice is a big, beautiful, bold title. And I wonder, can you talk me through the naming of the book? So, what did you mean by radical when you wrote it? And how is that different from maybe what we would ordinarily mean when we use the word justice? 

Nani Jansen Reventlow 

So the book’s title is derived from Angela Davis’s quote that radical simply means grasping things by the root. And it connects to the, well, the desire in the book to really set out root causes of the injustices that we’re seeing in the world today, um, with the idea that if we don’t really understand what the systems of oppression are that we’re, that we’re were facing and that we’re resisting, we’re unable to properly address them. Right? We might go to superficial changes or cosmetic solutions. So, the idea is to really go to the to the heart of things, to the root of things, but at the same time, to not have that feel too overwhelming for the reader. So what I also try to do is build a bridge between kind of like understanding root causes and also being able to take action in your day-to-day life. And I try to do that by both giving a lot of examples of activism from around the world, but also to, yeah, give entry points to the reader on how to reflect how these bigger systems show up in their daily life, and also what that means for their possibilities to actually do something within their own sphere of influence. But the radical thing is really about getting to the core of things so that we can also pursue systemic change that is going to be lasting. 

Jen Ang 

I love that. And again, I just building on what you said before, I feel particularly that using a word like radical, which brings to mind a set of visions as well, of growth and that idea of getting to the root. It’s unusual, actually, youknow, we use that word radical quite a lot. But your title asks us to reflect a little bit on the core meaning of that, of that word, which I love for this year in particular.  

And I’m really curious about your own journey as a lawyer and an activist. So how did you get to this point in your career when you thought you needed to write this book, and who do you hope you’re speaking to as you write it? 

Nani Jansen Reventlow 

I’m not sure that I thought I had to write this book, but once I got going, it was very nice to do it. 

And so the book came about, um, because I had published an op-ed in a Dutch newspaper about the need to have better conversations about reparations. That op-ed was actually kind of like born a little bit out of frustration of seeing always like, you know, half apologies, offers to commemorate, offers to do some more research and so on. And no one ever wants to talk about the money. And so, I made two arguments in the op-ed, basically like, first of all, we should be able to talk about the money. But the other thing is also that there are so many ways in which the impact of the transatlantic slave trade, of colonialism, is showing up in our day to day lives. Right now, there are so many entry points in which we can actually start addressing that legacy or that very much still alive dynamic rather than legacy, which kind of implies that it’s something that’s behind us. Right?  

But then I was approached by a Dutch publisher who said like, oh, would you be interested in writing a book about reparations? Because that conversation always seems to get a bit stuck. And I was like, well… I don’t think I’m the person to write a book about reparations. I’m not a reparations expert. But then instead of just saying no, I was like, well, maybe there’s a way in which we can actually bring that second element in, right? Like, how do we actually look at the intertwining systems of injustice that we’re seeing in our society today? And what could we do to address that?  

And that was basically how the how the idea for the book got started. And it was a really wonderful opportunity to have a little bit more space than, you know, a blog post or an op-ed or a journal article to actually think through some of the issues I’ve been working on, some issues thematic and some issues that I saw as like cross-cutting across activism. Yeah. So that’s how that came about.  

And I think a little bit, and I write about this in the introduction of the book, that I used to write a lot when I was much younger, and then ended up writing for work quite a lot. But being able to have this space to really explore some topics in depth kind of reignited that passion that I’d always had for writing. So it was a really nice way of reconnecting with that part of myself as well.  

I hope that the book is not only interesting for lawyers, let me maybe put it that way first. I think it will resonate naturally with a lot of lawyers because obviously I’m a lawyer myself, and that’s kind of like my corner of activism in this world and strategic litigation in particular. But I hope that it will be, um, well, two things.  

One is that I hope for people who are engaged in activism in whatever shape or form, it can kind of be a combination of both recognition, but also hopefully a bit of inspiration by reading about what other people are doing to resist in other parts of the world, that it might spark new ideas or, yeah, that people kind of like feel like, oh, we have allies, we have people who are doing similar things. Perhaps, you know, that that might encourage and yeah, reinvigorate, what people are already doing.  

The other thing is that I hope that some people will pick up the book just because they’re kind of fed up with what they’re seeing around them, and they want to figure out how they can get involved. And I hope that the book can help lower the threshold. As I mentioned, there’s a there’s a number of different thematic issues that are being addressed in the book. And I usually kind of read essay collections just starting wherever the mood of the day takes me and I start here. And then I hope across the book in different ways, I’m just hoping that someone might pick up the book because they’re interested in, I don’t know, reparations or in digital rights or they are intrigued by the idea of hero worship and activism, and, you know, why I think that’s a problem. And they might start there. And then they might kind of like read a bit about other things and find some new things about topics that they already know and also get exposed to some new ideas. I hope that it might open some doors and lower some thresholds to taking action. 

Jen Ang 

Thank you Nani, I have to agree and we will put links to where you can get the book in the show notes.  

But something that I really loved about it is that your essays, they don’t shy away from the detail and the history that informs your thinking, but each of them is followed by a set of further resources and some practical steps that people can take, which to me feels very satisfyingly activist, but also welcoming, because I think a lot of these ideas seem quite intimidating in the abstract, particularly if you’re not a lawyer or you’ve never thought about that area. I’ve not thought about reparations a lot, but that format for each of your chapters really invites people to kind of dip in and dip out. And yeah, I like that idea and to browse between topics. So it’s a bit like going into a library, picking up a book, and then actually turning and saying maybe something that’s nearby I might be interested in as well. And I’ll just because I’m so curious – so now that you have your serene writing space and you have sort of allowed a bit of space for your passion for writing to resurface, can we expect more writing from you. Are you taking a bit of a break or would you, would you consider doing some short articles from time to time? 

Nani Jansen Reventlow 

So I actually just yesterday finished a new manuscript. So it’s a more personal story that I’m telling there. I speak about it a little bit in introduction to the book. It’s about the relationship with my white Dutch mother who raised me. So my father is a Black Malian man, and my mother was a white Dutch woman. And my mother never really educated herself on anti-racism. And, in the beginning when I was younger, that wasn’t that big a deal because I just kind of existed in this bubble in which I kind of like looked at the world through, through a white lens. But as my kind of my professional but also personal journey kind of like took me more and more into this field that I’m very deeply involved in now, on racial, social and economic justice, that became more and more of a point of tension between us. And I thought it would be good to just kind of like reflect on that. Like, what does that actually mean? What does it mean in relation to the idea of, of love, right within a family? And, uh, how does that actually correspond to willingness or unwillingness to learn about anti-racism? So that’s a manuscript that that has just been finished.  

I have wild plans of writing fiction. Uh, I have a number of,I think, nice ideas for short stories. I’m also contemplating the next book that will probably be more aligned with Radical Justice in which I would love to examine what stands between us as activists, what is the thing that prevents us from acting in proper strategic unity when it comes to fighting for change? The thing that we see the far-right being so incredibly good at, overcoming differences and just kind of forming a united front. And I want to look at both the things that make our ecosystem so difficult, such as the whole, you know, capitalist dynamic with funding and resourcing and so on, but also the human dimension. Like we’re generally, we don’t learn very well how to deal with things such as jealousy or envy and things like that. Like, how do we deal with that? How can we get better at, you know, acknowledging conflict and navigating that – with the hope that we can have better conversations about those things that, in the hope that we can actually start working together better. 

Jen Ang 

Well, Nani, I want to read all those things that you’ve already written or suggest you will write, but I also want you to write them quickly because I feel particularly now we need them both and quickly! But I will be patient.  

But I just want to say, I think there’s such a real value sharing your thoughts in these ways, that I know you do, which are, you know, consciously accessible and clear and very generous actually in bringing yourself to that work. Sothank you.  

I’m going to actually sort of pull a bit of a thread now about law and activism, because it’s one of the reasons I wanted to speak to you. I’m so curious about your career, but also how you have positioned yourself in the work that you do. So this question is as follows.  

As a fellow lawyer and activist, I really struggle with the role of law in creating and reinforcing inequality. And I wonder whether there is a role for law and lawyers in using law to create positive social change. And or if really, when we see the law and we see the law in other people’s hands, we feel we see the oppression first. So how do you sit with this tension for yourself in your career, but also in your book? 

Nani Jansen Reventlow 

So I talk about this in the book and I reference Audre Lorde’s famous, almost overly quoted, words that the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. Because when I read that essay again a number of years ago, it just really made me pause deeply about working as a lawyer, as a human rights lawyer. And it really made me question like, how can I, how can I say that I want to kind of like change things. I want to bring about structural change. I want to improve things. And at the same time, I’m using like the ultimate master’s tools, right? Because if we look at our legal system as something that really reproduces power structures in our society, like, yeah.  

And so I sat with that for quite a while. It’s like, should I throw it all out the window? Or should I just kind of do something completely different? And… I ended up, um, with the view that we have to operate on two different tracks simultaneously. Um, one is the big work, right, of imagining alternative systems. Like what, what should it look like if we could design our world from scratch, what would it look like? How, how would it really work for everyone in it? Uh, everyone and everything in it. So that’s the world making project, right? It’s the big imagining and it’s constructing and so on, which is long term work. And it’s not going to happen overnight. And while we do that work, we also need to make sure that the systems that we have right now work better than they do at the moment. At the very least, they should not create more harm. That’s a very, you know, hard like line there. But ideally they start actually work maybe producing some justice, right? Like in the meantime, while we work on rebuilding the systems, the important thing there is to not mistake making the systems work better in the interim for the end goal, because that’s not the ambition that we should be having. We should really be dreaming about alternatives. But while we do that and while we build them, we need to make sure that what we have works.  

This is where like, I think that the work, for example, that we’re doing with Systemic Justice now sits like in working with marginalised communities and how they can actually use the law for their campaigns for change rather thanthe experience that a lot of them have of the law being used against them, being weaponised against them. How can we make sure that we, for example, de-centre ourselves as lawyers, that we really create the space for marginalised communities to lead, for their vision to lead the work for their choices and decisions to really guide the process. I hope that at least as an interim, that can be… that can be a good thing, good thing to do. But the ideal obviously is that an organisation like ours wouldn’t be needed anymore because we figured out a much better alternative to the systems that we have today. 

Jen Ang 

Yeah, 100%. I will sign up to that vision. And meanwhile, I love that combination of not giving up on the dreaming and visioning but also taking practical steps day to day. I could carry on for a while, but I’m not going to abuse your generosity. And we’ll move towards the next set of questions.  

So, I’m quite curious as well – and you spoke a little bit earlier, I kind of drew you on doing a bit more writing, but – overall, um, your career has been varied, but really full of lots of different pieces of work and you’ve practised as a lawyer, you’ve founded more than one organisation, you’ve funded legal work, you supervise it. You’re an author and a thinker. I’m curious to know what’s next for you now? So aside from your writing projects… what more could you possibly do, Nani? Or maybe another way, what, what other issues most capture your imagination now in 2026?  

Nani Jansen Reventlow 

Oh, this is a really good question. So I actually am process of leaving Systemic Justice – so the second organisation that I founded and that process will be complete this summer, and I’m actually quite deliberately trying to not make up my mind yet. And first actually take a moment. I want to take a break. I have never done that in my working life, also not between my previous organisation, the Digital Freedom Fund and this one, and just kind of give it a bit of space to see what emerges.  

I have some ideas of like how in an ideal world, I can continue building on some of the things that I’ve learned over the past years, right? Like what are the things that are hard or that could work better, especially for people starting organisations or starting initiatives and things like that. But also, I want to have a bit more space to do that writing. So, I’m hoping to figure out a way to balance those two. But I’m very deliberately trying to see like what will actually happen in my head when I’m not in the process of either already building a project or finishing it, or like having it run and things like that. Just to, maybe there is something completely different that comes out of that. Looking back at the work that I’ve done so far, it always looks like a very neatly laid plan. But it wasn’t. It was basically me just kind of like following my curiosity and wanting to kind of always like, move a little bit out of my comfort zone, being able to learn new things. And yeah, I’m hoping that there’ll be a next step like that to pursue. 

Jen Ang 

Brilliant. Well, Nani, I have to say that if that is your approach, following your curiosity, learning new things and obviously standing up when you see injustice, that’s been working for you so far. So I think I think more of that! And also, I think if you’ve not taken a break for a long while, that is well deserved and overdue.  

And I will say for myself, as listeners know, I founded JustRight Scotland and then stepped down and for a period of time, also, my only goal was just not to fill that time with the many different interesting things that I could fill it with. But I think there is something both for yourself, but also for the world about, you know, quite consciously giving space for reflection, because a lot of what we know doesn’t really surface until we actually sit and allow it to. So I hope you enjoy that come the summer. And as I said before, we’ll all be eagerly awaiting your next your next big thing.  

So meanwhile, I have one more question for you. So, there will be people listening. There’ll be people out there who might be a younger version of you, who might actually want to be you when they grow up. And I wonder what advice might you have for those people? 

Nani Jansen Reventlow 

Oh, so I think maybe… one moment in my working life so far, found really difficult and also illuminating was when I, for the first time, stepped away from very clearly defined role. This was when I had been defending journalists and bloggers around the world at Media Defence, and I was just like, okay, I don’t want to be pigeonholed in this forever. I need to kind of like figure out something broader. I want to do other human rights work as well, but I didn’tknow exactly what to do. And I just found myself just like looking at the offerings that were there, right, within other human rights organisations. And nothing seemed to really fit. And I ended up as a next step, like, um, because I was in a fellowship, kind of like an interim year. They’re working on a project, but I found myself as a next step actually is setting up an organisation, which was not something that I ever imagined that I’d do, not something that I probably, if I’d known what that was like, I don’t know if I would have. It was kind of like blissful ignorance and kind of like jumping into that and just figuring out, oh, I can just figure it out as I go along.  

But I think that the most informative thing about all of that was that… you can create the thing that allows for you to do the work that really drives you. And…  it’s not necessarily a very clear-cut path from this kind of role to that kind of role, etc… I very much remember that when I went to law school, which for me already was like a second choice, right? Because I first studied to be a dentist and ran away from that. So I’ve taken some detours and kind of like… and finding my way.  

But that there were people that I was in class with who were just know exactly like, yes, I want to be a judge on child custody cases in a family court in this… and I was just like, how do you know that? Like already? And I think just kind of giving yourself the flexibility to just kind of indeed, like have a plan, by all means, it’s great. But also please be flexible and… don’t be tough on yourself. If you end up taking a different route than you than you might have expected.  

There’s a lot of interesting stuff out there that you can’t possibly know. When you start out, you have to discover it as you go along. So yeah, try to be like both purposeful but also flexible. I think that is probably the best summary of my slightly long answer there. 

Jen Ang 

Oh, thank you so much, Nani, for those wise and warm words. And also thank you for joining us today on the show. 

Nani Jansen Reventlow 

Thanks so much for having us. Absolute pleasure. 

Jen Ang 

And that’s a wrap for today’s episode with Nani Jansen Reventlow, award-winning lawyer, activist, and author of the recently published book Radical Justice.  

If you are inspired by what Nani has shared, please have a look at our show notes for links where you can learn more. And if you want some practical pointers for getting involved, I particularly recommend looking at some of the further resources and practical tips that appear at the end of each chapter to her new book.  

We will be back again soon with our next episode, a one-to-one interview with the brilliant Lily Greenan, a queer and feminist activist and former chief executive of Scottish Women’s Aid. She will share with us lessons learned from the early days of LGBT+ rights activism in the 80s and 90s in Scotland, as well as an insight into what it really takes to continue to battle for equal protection against harm for all women and girls in Scotland.  

Thanks for tuning in to our Lawmanity podcast again and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please do hit the like and subscribe buttons and share our episodes with friends and colleagues who might enjoy learning a little bit more about how law really works in practice and how it can be used to make the world a better, brighter place.  

The Lawmanity podcast is co-produced by me, your host Jen Ang, and by the brilliant and talented Natalia Uribe. Shout out to Helena Refai for mentoring us through our first year of this incredible project. And thanks also to Amanda Amaeshi, on graphics and socials. The music you’ve been listening to is Always On The Move by Musicians in Exile, a Glasgow-based music project led by people seeking refuge in Scotland. Thanks so much for tuning in today. We hope you enjoyed listening and see you next time. 

Additional resources for this episode are linked below: 

• Buy Nani’s book ‘Radical Justice’ here: https://www.plutobooks.com/product/radical-justice/ 

• Inspired and want to do something about it?  Check out “Take Action” on the Radical Justice website: https://radicaljusticebook.com/take-action/ 

• Want to hear more from Nani and also get 30% off the book?  Sign up to Nani’s newsletter here: https://tinyurl.com/y3v8mfwu follow her other projects here: https://www.nanijansen.org/ 

Host: Jen Ang

Quote: Talat Yaqoob

“If we can use law as a way to redistribute power, that would be justice.”

Jen Ang

Welcome to the Lawmanity podcast where we explore the complex relationship between law and activism and discuss the different ways that law can oppress but can also lead to real positive social change. I’m Jen Ang, a human rights lawyer and activist based in Scotland and your host on the Lawmanity podcast.

This week we’re speaking to the brilliant Talat Yaqoob. Talat is an award-winning feminist campaigner, consultant and commentator who focuses on women’s inequality, racism and intersecting inequalities. She is co-founder and chair of the cross-party campaign group Women 50:50, pushing for equal representation of women in Scottish politics. In 2019, she also launched Pass the Mic, an organisation which hosts the first and only directory of women of colour experts in Scotland, challenging underrepresentation and misrepresentation in media and influencing. Talat is also co-chair of the First Minister’s National Advisory Council for Women and Girls in Scotland and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

Welcome to the show, Talat. It is such a pleasure to have you.

Talat Yaqoob

Thanks. It’s great to be here.

Jen Ang

I am a total fan, as you know! But also one of the things that I really enjoy when I’m listening to you speak and write is actually the breadth of your perspective on some of these questions and also the incredibly clear way that you put across those views. So I’m really looking forward to hearing more from you today about the law very broadly, and how you feel it works or doesn’t work, for you, for your community, for the people you work with. 

And that rolls us into our first question which is just a bit of a surprise opener. When I speak to people, I really like to try and start with a bit of a sense of who people are, you know, the, the actual personalities behind the work that we do. And a friend of mine told me a while ago that our oldest sense is our sense of smell. And that actually the sense of smell can connect to deep memories or to places that you know, that just come to mind when you, when you think of something.

So my first question for you is actually is there a particular smell that love or that you, that transports you to a place or that you recognise when you smell, that you want to tell us about?

Talat Yaqoob

Okay, that is a left field question!

Well, first things first, I’m also a big fan of yours. So this can just be a podcast where we’re fangirling over each other, I would endorse that.

In terms of smell. When you were talking, the first thing I thought about was my mum’s cooking. So, it would be when walking home from school Friday, half day in Edinburgh and I would, when you get to, outside the door, you could already figure out what it was that was being cooked and you knew you were into a treat, if Mum had, the smell of aloo paratha – so that is, chapati with butter spiced potato stuffed inside. That smell, that is the best smell. That’s when you know you’re home, and it’s also going to be a really good day.

Jen Ang

Oh, that’s amazing. Thank you. And even as you describe that, I’m sort of transported and a little bit jealous.

Talat Yaqoob

Yeah, come over anytime.

Jen Ang

I can relate. Yeah, that’s amazing. The smells of home. 

So the series is about equality before the law. And the idea that the law, strives for equality or treats people equally is a really important concept for lawyers. There are times when people question whether that’s really true. 

So the first question is for you, do you think that the law does achieve equality or treat people equally for you and the communities you work with?

Talat Yaqoob

So if I was to talk about it for myself and the vast majority of communities I work with – that would be, you know, the community of women, of sisterhood, community of colours that I work with, so whether it was black, Asian minority, ethnic communities, disabled people’s communities that I work with, and then Muslim communities of which I am part and also work with – and it’s a resounding no. With the intention, you would hope, the intention of the law seeing everybody as equal would be there. But the law in itself does not sit in a vacuum away from the realities of society, whether historic or current, existing, the institutionalised, the systemic inequalities are threaded into which laws are made, how they are made and, critically, how they’re implemented. And the mindsets, the thinking, the institutionalised inequalities across the board within that they will come to the fore in all of those spaces with wherever law is being written, developed, implemented. So unless there is some real proactive work to rectify that, then actually in the current society we exist within, can it ever treat everybody equally?

Jen Ang

Understood. And I think just to ask a bit of a cheeky follow up question: you’ve named a number of different communities that you hold in mind. Are there any particular types of law or examples of places where you feel that the law as it’s written or the law is applied doesn’t feel like it’s treating people equally.

Talat Yaqoob

So unfortunately there’s no shortage of examples and this is largely because I’ve been reading quite a lot about this recently and when you were chatting to me, the first thing that I was thinking about that was in the back of my mind was the Counter Terrorism and Security Act of, I think, 2015. So, in law, in writing, that is about keeping the nation and the nation’s people safe. But actually, it has created unsafe spaces, insecurity and concern for those of us who will appear Muslim, who are particularly for black and brown men, for hijab or burqa wearing women. And we see that largely through the way in which the Prevent strategy, which is obviously part of that Act, is implemented. Now human rights organisations have repeatedly called out and evidenced the racism and Islamophobia that is inherent in the way in which the Prevent strategy has been implemented and how it is being used as a method to penalise rather than protect. 

And in particular what I often go to is the way in which the Prevent strategy has a obligation on those who work in the public sector, public authority spaces. So within our NHS, within schools, to report what they determine as extremism and the definition of terrorism within it is so wide and if you think about systemic inequality and leaving it to the perceived objectivity of an individual to decide what is extremism. We have seen multiple reporting and referrals to Prevent which have been wholly inappropriate, unevidenced. A disproportionate number are children and young people. In one case that was, was described it was because a young woman had decided to start wearing the hijab. That was reason enough for her to be considered potentially radicalised. Now that is the demonisation of a religion, that’s a demonisation of the expression of religion and religious belief. And so that is an example of where the implementation of so-called protection in law is implemented in a way and in my view also written in a way that demonises a particular community.

Jen Ang

Thank you for sharing that example, very clearly actually, and I’m inclined to agree. Something that I recall about the Prevent strategy is that it was challenged in the drafting. So, from the earliest stages there was plenty of input pointing out that some of what might happen in terms of the unequal application of that law might come to pass. And it has been repeatedly challenged, with empirical research around the consequences.

Talat Yaqoob

Absolutely.

Jen Ang

Something that’s particularly frustrating to me is one of the ways in which the law has been defended successfully has been the assertion that there may be, for some cases and in some communities, an unequal impact, but that is somehow justifiable with reference to the need to protect national security. And many of you will know that there are various exclusions to the application of some areas of law, like national security, public health and so on. But those exclusions are not absolute. That’s not an absolute response to the idea that the law or the implementation of the law is having a harmful impact. And yet we seem quite stuck, publicly at least, and also perhaps in the law itself, around those points. 

And that brings me on to my next question, which is actually asking that we sort of zoom out a little bit. Do you sort of, in your gut, do you see the law as more of a barrier or a tool for positive social change or the equality that you’re seeking to advance?

Talat Yaqoob

So I think it can be both, but I think it is so deeply influenced by where society, people and politics is at the time. 

So if you’d asked me a few years ago, I think I’d be much more secure in saying both. In the current political landscape that we’re in, where law is being very successfully used to demonise communities, either to eradicate rights that are in law, or to manipulate the interpretation of the law, or to change completely the law or implement new ones. 

Now, I’m not just talking about America here, I am talking about here in the UK. We’re seeing it across Europe as well. The rise of far-right politics and populism actually uses the law to its advantage with exceptional strength, with exceptional clarity. So with that influence right now, it feels more like a barrier than a positive tool, but it is so dependent on where society is, and I think that really reinforces how law is not separate from politics and society. Where we are as a society dictates what laws we prioritise, implement, write, and how they’re written, who they’re written by, all of those things. 

So I think I still hold strong to the fact that it can be both, but it is so dependent on where politics and society is at the time.

Jen Ang

So, for Talat with us, coming up to the May 2026 elections in Scotland, I wondered what, for you, are some of the key issues that you’d like to see the new Scottish Government focus on to tackle that inequality that we’ve talked about as already baked into our laws and to ensure that Scotland doesn’t become the next site for uses of the law that, as you put it, demonise communities and eradicate individual rights.

Talat Yaqoob

Yeah, I think this is a really important political point in the landscape for Scotland. 

As polling currently indicates, it might be an SNP majority. It’s looking really quite possible that it might be Reform that is in opposition. So the kind of conversations, the rhetoric, the priorities of the next Parliament will be really, I think, indicative of some of the concerns of the rise of far-right, the suppression of our own progress, advancement of the realisation of human rights. And so for me, the next Scottish Government needs to be unapologetic in pushing for progress, pushing for social and economic justice, and the protection of our institutions. 

So that means the protection of democratic institutions, the right to protest. Think what we’ve seen across the UK pursued by Westminster in terms of Palestine Action, for example, the right to protest, the right to challenge, methods of accountability – all of these things will be so incredibly important. And when it comes to the law, it is about rapid advancement and investment in the law being fit for purpose and access to justice for the most marginalised communities because they are such a clear target by the far-right. So, migrants, people of colour, asylum seekers, LGBT community, Muslims. What is the recourse to justice and how do we enable that to happen in a meaningful way that tackles systemic racism and misogyny within those sectors themselves, and actually puts money into the pockets of those individuals and those who are marginalised and economically disenfranchised to be able to pursue justice?

Jen Ang

And that, as we can see, that can change so quickly. Absolutely. And is really actually something that I hope people are starting to think about, you know, more and more because that change is so visible for everyone in society just now. Certainly, as you know, I am American and I have been really surprised actually at how much more people are talking about law and political structures now than they were perhaps before the start of 2025. 

So, what for you is the role of lawyers in working with communities to advance equality?

Talat Yaqoob

So I think, you know, and I’m not just saying this because I’ve got lawyers in the family, so I’ve got to be nice about them! I do think that we should welcome lawyers having a role within community activism and the ability to be able to use the law in, what I would, my opinion would say, the right way. So that advancing of human rights, the protection of law, so, you know, for example, Liberty, the human rights organisation, successfully being able to illustrate evidence that the anti-protest laws were unlawful by the last government and maintained by this government. That is an example of activism and therefore communities engaged in activism being protected through the law.

So here Talat is referring to a legal challenge brought by Liberty against the anti-protest measures set out in 2013 [errata: Jen meant to say: 2023] and brought into effect by then Home Secretary Suella Braverman, which significantly lowered the threshold of when police can impose conditions on protests from anything that causes, quote, “serious disruption” to anything that causes, quote, more than “minor disruption”. These measures had been democratically voted down just a few months earlier, but Braverman had used secondary legislation which requires less parliamentary scrutiny to bring them into effect anyway. This was widely seen as a serious attack on the right to protest on all issues across the UK. And hundreds of protesters were arrested under these new measures before they were finally declared unlawful by the High Court in May 2024. This declaration was then upheld by the Court of Appeal for England and Wales in May 2025. The courts ruled, in essence, that then Home Secretary Suella Braverman did not have the power to create these regulations. Crucially, however, the question of how far a sitting parliamentary democracy can go in restricting those rights through democratic means has not yet been fully tested and remains a live site of contestation, as seen, for example, in the Crime and Policing Bill 2026 currently before Parliament, which radically expands police powers to restrict the right to protest, including banning repeat protests or protesting on an issue more than once over an unspecified area for an unspecified period of time. 

As Lord Peter Hain pointed out when he and other peers opposed the Bill in the House of Lords, “no protest movement has ever brought about change through one single march or action”. This bill, if passed into law, is bound to also face legal challenge. Let’s go back to Talat’s thoughts on the role of lawyers in challenging inequality under the law.

Talat Yaqoob

And so having that space, having that platform used by lawyers, by human rights defenders, I think that is an exceptional use of law. And that is where I think you can have the law for good and lawyers for good, absolutely.

I think in the same way with politics that I wouldn’t agree with, you have lawyers that are doing the same thing on the other side. And I think that the idea of objectivity and the law being absolute and all lawyers have to take this line and it’s… I think that illustrates how much of a myth that is because the interpretation of the law is political in itself. 

So I think there’s… there absolutely can be and should be a role for that activism for lawyers. And I’ve seen it happen here in Scotland, I’ve seen it happen across the UK, I’ve seen it happen across the world: where rights have been advanced, people have been protected, asylum seekers have been, vulnerable asylum seekers prevented from being wrongly deported, because of the right use of the law. So, it’s to be welcomed and I’d love to see even more of it.

Jen Ang

Thank you for that reflection. And I also, actually, I feel, as a practising human rights lawyer, that was quite positive and rousing reflection on, some of the uses of the law and where it works. And I would want to invite you to come speak to my colleagues and my team sometime just to remind us of that, because I think exactly as you said, there are lawyers on both sides of any major case. And one of the things that we struggle with as lawyers and our own identity actually is how much is our role about being sort of a neutral advocate or, ah, the phrase we use is maybe, an “advocate for hire”. And how much of what we do is about only taking work that will advance positions or causes that are important to us. And that’s definitely something that we grapple with throughout these podcasts. 

So my near final question, what to you, if the law were equal and it were just, what does justice in the law look like for you or your community or the people you work with?

Talat Yaqoob

Wow. Okay, so what does law as injustice look like, for the community? Do you know what? I have to say that I think if we can use law as a way to redistribute power, that would be justice. That’s not the way in which we think about law and write law. A lot of law is written as… in a reactionary way. An issue has occurred, a law is required, this is what will be done in the future. And it is focused deeply on criminalisation. It’s focused on… And I know that sounds like, well, of course it is, but actually, no, the thinking around it, about the realisation of rights and law as a tool to redistribute power, to create accountability, that is law that creates justice. That’s law that people can have more trust in. You know, so if we think about things like we’re in Scotland, the acts that we pass, the law that we implement, regardless of whether it’s Scotland, UK, any nation actually, if we write law that centres the redistribution of power, that centres the ability for accountability to be closer to people, that’s transformative. That’s transformative justice. In my view, that is social justice being realised through the law. And for me it’s about looking at the way in which law is written and the rationale with which new laws are created. The mindset behind that is what needs to change. And if that can be more about redistribution, that can be more about transformation and social justice in which laws we choose to prioritise and the mindset behind them. I think that could change the face of society in a radically short time. And actually it would make law and lawmaking an accessible feature of society. But it’s about the mindset behind why law is created and what law is for. If we could do more about that, if we could do more to challenge that, that it doesn’t need to be this traditional, archaic view of what law is and why law exists and that law is to pursue the criminalisation of society or for a hierarchy to come and protect society rather than enabling the protection of itself. I think that would be transformative.

Jen Ang

I love that. And I also don’t, almost don’t want to carry on and comment because that’s the world I want to live in. But I think, I also think, you know, what you highlighted is certainly a part of legal jurisprudence. It’s part of what law students learn about as a theory of how the law relates to society. And that does give me some hope because it means that the roots of that approach to thinking about law and lawmaking, they run deep, and they’re still kind of accessible to us through the institutions as they now run. But I also think that you’re right that maybe in recent years, and particularly here in the UK, law as a tool of social control or criminalisation has become the more prominent way that we talk about and we see lawmaking happen. And actually I’ll probably add as well, and where the judiciary or other, other parts of the legal system step out of line with that, sometimes you will see quite strong attacks on, on methods of lawmaking that are very much within our longer tradition. So, yes, that was a really interesting reflection that got me to sort of think about, or to relate back to what the practise of law has looked like and how it’s changed over the last few years. 

So on to our final, final question. And the last question, is just this – and I’m sure you do get asked this quite a lot because I know that you are such a mentor and someone that many people I know look up to, and it is-

Talat Yaqoob

I’m trying really hard to not, like, to keep my face straight while you say that.

Jen Ang

I know, I know you hate that, but I’m going to ask you anyway, because this is the sort of thing that people want to know. 

So, my question is, if someone is listening to this podcast and they kind of, they just wonder how you got to where you are and you know, and what it takes. What would be your advice to your younger self or to someone who is maybe just starting their career and thinking about what a journey like yours would look like?

Talat Yaqoob

Okay, so the somewhat facetious response is sunscreen and moisturiser – and I do wish I had gone back and said that to myself. 

I think, what’s really interesting is that this is not a… I didn’t know this was a career. At no point did I think this was a career. If I was to follow what it was that I thought I’d be doing at the age of 18, I should be a clinical psychologist right now. And so I guess the advice would be if an opportunity presents itself and it lights something, even if it’s not on the plan, do it. Because I very, very easily, and very closely didn’t do it because I was like, well, I’ve got a five-year plan and I meant to go and do a master’s and then I meant to go and become a clinical psychologist and I meant to do my doctorate and… and I, I almost didn’t do it, but then, you know, at university I realised that actually, hold on, my politics has been given an outlet and there are these really great people that I’m able to have conversations with and we’re debating and nobody’s telling me shush, like, like they do at the dinner table at home. Like it’s not. And, and had I not taken that opportunity, that feels kind of exciting but isn’t in the plan, isn’t the status quo, nobody before me has done it… I wouldn’t get to do what I do now. And as hard as it is and sometimes as upsetting as it is, I wouldn’t want to be anybody else, I wouldn’t want to be doing anything else. 

So even if it’s not on the plan, it’s not in the five-year plan or the ten-year plan – and if you’re, you’re like me, you probably have one – if it feels good and it feels exciting, give it a try. Especially if it maybe is a little bit uncomfortable. I would advocate for that because 100% I would not be doing anything that I did if I didn’t go to become, ah, my student union and suddenly get involved and find really awesome people and then suddenly get involved in other campaigns and yeah, give it a try. Even if it’s temporary, it’s something worth learning.

Jen Ang

Amazing. Thank you for that motivating and inspiring advice. I think we’re all really pleased that you gave it a try and that you continue to, just looking back at the number of organisations that you’ve had a hand in founding, co-founding and supporting over the years. 

Also thank you so much for your time today. You’ve been very generous. We know how busy you are but I’m so, so pleased to have been able to have this chat with you and also learned a little bit more about you. I reflect that however long you work with someone, sometimes it’s always worth spending a little more time speaking about yourself, having a cuppa.

Talat Yaqoob

This was really surprisingly soothing conversation given what it is that we’re talking about. So thank you so much for the invitation and, and thank you for everything that you do, Jen. It’s always an inspiration and I really value learning from you. Thank you.

Jen Ang

If you wanted to learn more about some of the issues Talat has raised, have a look at our show notes for this episode and we’ll point you towards a few resources for finding out more about the impact of the Prevent strategy in the UK, about your right to protest and upcoming changes in the government bill to restrict those rights. And if you want to get involved locally, I asked Talat what her recommendations are and here’s what she said.

Talat Yaqoob

Well, I’m going to obviously recommend that they join Women Against the Far Right Scotland because I’m co-convener of Women Against the Far Right Scotland. But there are lots of campaigns happening in civic society and whether that is disabled people’s organisations and disabled people organising themselves. There’s a lot of work happening to push for a different economy, a radical, genuine wealth redistribution, for example Tax Justice, which is a UK-wide campaign. Patriotic Millionaires, if you happen to be somebody who’s very wealthy and cares about a new tax system, would be a space for you to go. And also there’s a lot of people who are fighting for justice and for accountability in for example policing like the Sheku Bayoh case for justice, and campaign for justice for him. So there’s so many things that are happening in Scotland and beyond and what we need is movement-building, community connections and building up power for people to be able to also do their own campaigning because the more we can do that, the more justice and accountability we can actually pursue and systemic change we can pursue.

Jen Ang

And that’s a wrap for today’s episode with Talat Yaqoob, feminist activist, political commentator, stone-cold legend and my hero. 

We’ll be back again soon with our next episode, an interview with Nani Jansen Reventlow, human rights lawyer and founder of the fierce and fearless strategic litigation organisation Systemic Justice, on the publication of her new book Radical Justice. 

Thanks for tuning in to our Lawmanity podcast again and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please do hit the like and subscribe buttons and share our episodes with friends and colleagues who might enjoy learning a little bit more about how law really works in practice and how it can be used to make the world a better, brighter place. 

The Lawmanity podcast is co-produced by me, your host Jen Ang, and by the brilliant and talented Natalia Uribe. Shout out to Halina Rifai for mentoring us through our first year of this incredible project. And thanks also to Amanda Amaeshi, on graphics and socials. The music you’ve been listening to is Always On The Move by Musicians in Exile, a Glasgow-based music project led by people seeking refuge in Scotland. Thanks so much for tuning in today. We hope you enjoyed listening and see you next time.

Episode Notes:

Additional resources for this episode are linked below:

Learn More

• Amnesty International, “UK’s Governtment’s Prevent Duty ‘Fundamentally Incompatible’ with Human Rights – Major New Report,” 2 November 2023, https://www.amnesty.org.uk/latest/uk-governments-prevent-duty-fundamentally-incompatible-human-rights-major-new-report/
• Liberty – Protest Rights, https://www.libertyhumanrights.org.uk/fundamental/protest-rights/

Get Involved

• Women Against the Far Right Scotlandhttps://www.instagram.com/womenagainstfarrightscotland/
• Tax Justice UK & Patriotic Millionaires UKhttps://taxjustice.uk/  and https://patrioticmillionaires.uk/

• The Justice for Sheku Bayoh Campaignhttps://www.stuc.org.uk/campaigns-sheku/

Errata: In the podcast, Jen refers to “a legal challenge brought by Liberty against the anti-protest measures set out in 2013 and brought into effect by then Home Secretary Suella Braverman” – this should refer to “2023,” not “2013.”

Host: Jen Ang

Quote: Davie Donaldson

“For Gypsy Travellers, the law has always been weaponised in Scotland. I mean, you can go right back to the early 1500s and see some of the first anti-Gypsy legislation being brought into play. The law’s been their tool to curtail that. So for Gypsy Travellers, it’s always been this David and Goliath battle.”

Jen Ang

Welcome to the Lawmanity podcast where we explore the complex relationship between law and activism and discuss the different ways that law can oppress but can also lead to real social change. I’m Jen Ang, a human rights lawyer and activist based in Scotland and your host on the Lawmanity podcast.

This week we’re speaking to activist and legend Davie Donaldson. Davie is an award-winning Scottish traveller advocate with over a decade of experience. As senior EDI consultant at Cognac Advocacy and Engagement, Davie supports decision makers at a local, national and international level, to increase the inclusivity of policy towards Gypsy Traveller communities – with one newspaper calling him Scotland’s top campaigner for traveller rights. 

Davie is also a regular podcast host with BBC Scotland, most recently hosting the podcast ‘The Cruelty: Stolen Generations’ which has recently been shortlisted for the True Crime 2026 Awards in the ‘Impact for Change’ category. This is an incredible series and if you have not listened to it, I’ll put it in the show notes for you to listen to later. 

So welcome to the show, Davie, and I’m so delighted that you’re joining me today.

Davie Donaldson

No, thanks for having me. I’m really excited to get into this.

Jen Ang

It’s a long-awaited excuse to just spend some time with you and to hear a bit more about what you’re up to!

So, as an opener in this podcast, I have a kind of an unusual question. and it’s just to get us settled and to help people learn a little bit about the people behind the legends we’re interviewing. So, a good friend pointed out that our sense of smell is one of our oldest senses and we can hold deep connections between smell and our memories. So, if you don’t mind, could I please ask you to tell me about a smell that is meaningful for you? Maybe one that you really like or one that’s connected to a time or place that you like to bring to mind.

Davie Donaldson

Wow. I mean, that’s a cracker of a question, isn’t it? 

A smell… I guess, for me. I mean there’s many smells that bring me back to my childhood and I guess make me feel happy. Right. And I think smell really does touch that kind of human base of, you know, experience and memory and remembrance. 

But for me, I guess the smell that I would pick would be the smell of gas. And that may sound a bit strange initially, but I’ll clarify. The smell of gas in a caravan, in a trailer, and when you first click the cooker on in a trailer, you get this kind of puff of gas and it’s an indistinguishable smell from anything else. And that smell to me reminds me of lying in my bed as a child and hearing my dad get up and turn it on to get a cup of tea in the morning. And that smell reminds me of safety because it was also the last smell I would smell before going to sleep at night, as my mum would make us our nighttime snacks right when the door was closed. 

So, it’s a smell of safety, it’s a smell of belonging as well, because I only ever smelled it when I was on the road with my own people and it was a smell that I had never had in a house. So for me it’s safety. For me it’s experience and it’s the smell of “wow, today’s another day, it’s a new day where I’m going to experience something great, right? There’s something would be exciting today”. 

So, I guess that would be the smell that I would pick. And it’s one that even today as an adult, it really brings me back to that place of being a child and that kind of awe and imagination and I guess the creativity that comes with every day when you’re so young. 

Jen Ang

Oh, amazing. Thank you. Thank you for sharing that. 

And now, there’s no kind of avoiding it onto a few big questions that I have for you today. From your perspective as an activist, do you feel that the law works equally for you in Scotland or for your community, however you choose to define community, and why or why not?

Davie Donaldson

I mean, where do I begin? Right? 

I mean, my work, since I’ve been about 15, has been trying to disentangle and navigate paths that were never built for Gypsy Travellers. Right. Infrastructures that were always built for settled populations and settled people are inherently difficult for Gypsy Travellers to navigate for a number of reasons. But when it comes to the legal system and the law, that task just becomes mammoth. 

On a personal level, I don’t believe it works in terms of, I don’t believe it’s very fair, I don’t believe it’s accessible. I don’t believe that the law and justice, I mean, if we pull it back to justice, I don’t believe that it works in a way for, non-sedentary, non-settled communities in Scotland.

I think as well, it’s important to recognise that for Gypsy Travellers, the law has always been weaponised in Scotland. I mean, you can go right back to the early 1500s and see some of the first anti-Gypsy legislation being brought into play. And from that point onwards, the law has always been seen by settled communities, particularly settled authorities who don’t want Gypsy Traveller or nomadic people to exist at times… The law’s been their tool to curtail that. So for Gypsy Travellers, it’s always been this David and Goliath battle since the very start of their, I guess, experience with our modern law system and its foundations. 

For me, my experience has been trying to navigate that both as an individual but also as an advocate for communities, right. And what that often means is trying to take word in from this really alien educated environment to the layman, to the local communities who perhaps have had very limited education, certainly not second and third levels of education, but also trying to think about, well, where is the law trying to confuse communities? Because oftentimes when they bring me in, it’s, “we’ve received this document and we don’t know what it means” or “we’ve received this citation and we have no idea what that means”. 

I mean, only recently, let’s give you an example. Last week I was contacted by a family who were travelling. It’s also important to notice that for Gypsy Travellers, experience with the law and with the justice system, it tends to be at these… what could be called conflict points. Regularly, those are experienced as Gypsy Travellers travelling, and because we don’t own the land on which we travel, oftentimes it leads to evictions. And evictions are the key, trigger point for our experience with the justice system. 

So, I was contacted by this family who were travelling. They stopped on a disused airfield and they’d stopped at 8 o’clock at night. They pulled onto this airfield and by 3 o’ clock the next day they’d received a Court of Session document outlining that they were to be evicted with immediate enforcement. They had 24 hours to respond to this written enforcement letter, which was about 15 pages long, that they had to respond in the form of answers to the Court of Session, which also meant that unless they were able to appoint a solicitor between 3 o’ clock and 5 o’ clock that day, and the solicitor was to be able to read over this document and be able to submit answers on their behalf, they were going to have to put the answers into the Court of Session by hand delivery. 

Now, you can imagine the mammoth task that that would be for anyone, but particularly for this family. It’s important to notice that they’d just been evicted from an industrial estate. All of their ancestral camps in the area had been blocked off. And so, they had a number of young children, we had elderly people, a number of disabilities present on the camp as well. And so for this family, it was really important, perhaps more than others, to be in a very safe location. A number of their children had quite severe autism, so they couldn’t stop at the side of the road because of the worry of traffic and the bairns needing space, right.

So they were beside themselves with worry. They had no idea what this meant. All they knew is that the letter threatened sheriff officer action where their vehicles would be towed away, where their caravans would be removed from the site, and where police enforcement might happen. So they were terrified.

So they contacted me. They sent me photographs of the citation that evening. I did my best to read through it from the kind of garbled photos, and then we together pulled together some answers and I then drove from the north of Scotland to Edinburgh to hand deliver it to the Court of Session. Now, when I got to the Court of Session, I was immediately faced with a security barrier. I’d got there at 1 o’ clock, I had to go up to the main office to speak to the reception and say, look, I need to go to the Court of Session and hand this document in. They said, oh, well, I’m sorry, but the Court of Session’s on its lunch break, so you won’t be able to get down there until 2 o’ clock. I said, okay. And they said, but you can wait. So I sat down and I waited for the hour. And in that time of waiting, and this is why I mentioned this, what might seem quite, I guess, an insignificant part of the story, but waiting is something that is highly triggering for Gypsy Traveller communities. Because waiting, particularly in a formal environment like a court or even just in an office building, it triggers all of those juvenile memories of being excluded at school, of being made to feel different, of dealing with the justice system in a way that’s inherently unjust. And so even for me, I guess I’m used to dealing with professional folk and police and social services and so on, but nonetheless, waiting in that moment was highly triggering. I felt my anxiety peaking, I felt my heart rate going… and at moments I wanted to walk out, right? I wanted to leave that building, I didn’t want to be there anymore in this really structured environment that was felt like the walls were closing in on every side. 

Eventually I got through. We got through the barrier, went down to the office. When I got there, I handed the document to the reception. They said, right, we need to check this. So then another period of waiting. So I then had to wait for another hour. By that stage, one of their office staff had had the document reviewed and checked by some seniors. They came back and they said, right, have you contacted the solicitor? And I said, no, because I know the name of the solicitor, but it’s a big multinational kind of firm. But I don’t know the name of the individual solicitor who’s dealing with the case. I wasn’t given any contact details because the interlocutor that we’d been given missed out a lot of the appendices. So we weren’t given all the information that the Court of Session had been given. We weren’t given contact details for the solicitor’s firm. Instead we were just given the formal address of the Court of Session. So the admin said, well, you have to speak to the solicitor. We can’t accept these as answers because they’re not in the appropriate format. I said, right, okay. I said, but what, what is the appropriate format? I can’t tell you that, he said, you know, you can hand these in online. I said, I can’t because I’m not a solicitor. He was like, ah, okay. He said, in what capacity are you acting with the occupiers? Now, I knew before going there that I couldn’t do anything that would imply I was a solicitor because then I’d be breaking the law. So I was very, very careful. But then I also wanted to ensure that it was clear that the document had been written with the occupiers and therefore that these families, you know, they weren’t having something placed on them, but they’d actually written this document alongside me, albeit with some support around, you know, the rights and legislation and so on. 

And I said, well, I’m an advocate, so I’m just wanting to help the families get their voices heard. Ah but you have to be acting in some capacity. What capacity? I said I knew I couldn’t admit that I had no idea what he was asking. I was terrified to do anything which might get me in hot water. So I think he eventually realised this and he said, look, I would go to the solicitor’s office. So I left there. I drove to the headquarters of the solicitors, went in, of course, I had no idea what solicitor I was asking for. I had no case reference or anything like that. I just had this legal document and I just handed it to someone and I said, look, I said, I really hope this counts as within the 24-hour period, because otherwise these families are facing eviction to, you know, to nowhere. There’s nowhere for them to go. Eventually I got an email back from the solicitors and they said they would consider the position, because there was clear evidence that there would be a breach of Public Sector Equality Duties. There was clear evidence of, there was no EQIA, no Equalities and Human Rights Impact Assessment had been carried out. It was impossible for it to have been carried out in that time period. Anyway,

Jen Ang

Here Davie has mentioned the evidence that no EQIA had been conducted, as clear evidence of a breach of Public Sector Equality Duties. 

What’s he talking about? 

Well, in the UK, under the Equality Act 2010, public authorities like local councils, the NHS, government departments like the Home Office and the DWP and so on, they have a Public Sector Equality Duty to consciously consider the need to eliminate discrimination, to advance equality of opportunity for everyone and to foster good relations between people, including people of different races, abilities and sexes. 

To fulfil this duty, public authorities are supposed to conduct an Equality Impact Assessment, or an EQIA, to analyse how their policies or services or decisions might impact particular groups, especially vulnerable, discriminated against and marginalised groups. They’re supposed to gather evidence, to actually go out and find and speak to people about what impact these decisions might have, to think about what they’ve been told and to make adjustments that minimise those negative impacts and foster good relations when they go about creating those policies or delivering those services or making those decisions. 

So here Davie is pointing to the failure to conduct an EQIA prior to the local authority’s decision to evict this family from their home, as relevant to possible discrimination on the basis of race as a protected characteristic, because Gypsy Travellers in Scotland, preserving their travelling way of life, has been recognised as a protected category under the Equality Act. 

Davie is pointing to a strong stateable legal reason why this case should not proceed, at least not until a proper EQIA has been produced and can be publicly and, transparently scrutinised. Davie continues.

Davie Donaldson

So there was significant concerns because it was a public authority who was doing the enforcement. So I then went back that night, drove up to the northeast of Scotland, went to visit the families, showed them, told them what had happened, gave them a copy of the letter and so on for their records. When I was speaking to them, they said, I don’t know what all the problems about. There’s no mess, there’s no antisocial behaviour, there’s been no complaints. All we want is somewhere safe for our kids to stay. 

And I think that one example shows you just the David and Goliath task that often exists for families. Many of the families that I work with have low rates of literacy. They have an absolute fear of the justice system. So if they’re ever given anything formal, their minds immediately go to what will happen to my children? Will social services get involved? Will my children be removed? What will happen to me? Will I end up in prison? You know, there’s such a lack of information around the rights of Gypsy Travellers within the community. But there’s also this predetermination of, well they’re going to find it wrong against me anyway, so what’s the point, you know. 

So it is a difficult situation and for that particular family, they’d been pushed from pillar to post, throughout this local authority. And the night before arriving to that camp they’d been told by a local authority officer who’d came down who was evicting them from their previous camp. They said, look, why are we being evicted? I mean in, in Murray they were stating – some other local authorities – in Murray in Aberdeenshire we even get provided with bins now. Side note, being provided with bins is such a basic thing. But for these families I think that shows you just how little support they get when they’re on the road. And they said that anyway to this local authority officer and her response was, well, if it’s so good up in Murray in Aberdeenshire, why don’t you pack your bags and go there? Because you’re not welcome here.

Jen Ang

Oh… the lawyer in me sort of bridles at that a little bit, but I’m just, I’m just gonna let that pass for now. Wow that’s, that’s horrible. That’s actually, I will actually, I will step in that, you know, that’s a level of sort of human cruelty that again I think probably is commonly seen but is so often actually surfaced and spoken about. And of course not only is there only one of you, but whenever I hear accounts like this I also think about, you know, what’s happened to probably the dozens, if not more, you know, other families in different places at different times who didn’t know who to call or who weren’t confident or sure enough that it would even be worth contesting.

Davie Donaldson

Yeah, I guess that example is the recent one and one that will help your listeners to understand the insurmountable task. I mean, in the words of the family, it would have been impossible and it was an impossible task, and I mean, even it getting taken immediately to the Court of Session in Edinburgh instead of local sheriff court was a tactic, right. These things don’t happen by mistake. it was Crown Authority land, so it also helps to know that you’ve got one of the most marginalised communities in Scotland going up against the King, you know. 

So I think there’s something to be said for the fact that solicitors and the legal profession are usually working on behalf of clients who want Gypsy Travellers to be removed, who don’t particularly care for the rights of Gypsy Travellers or the cultural rights or the cultural aspect of why we travel and why it’s so important for us to remain in touch with our culture and our sense of belonging. And so, because of that, unless Gypsy Travellers have means, which very few of us do, due to the structural discrimination that we face, lawyers are just something which is impossible for your average Gypsy Traveller family. And even at that, you know, where would they begin? Where would they start? So, for me, I usually come in at the stage of crisis, and I think something I’m really keen to highlight are these moments of crisis so that we can try and change the legal system so that it works better for communities who are at the sharp end of things. But it’s also important to recognise that there are no legal rights for Gypsy Travellers travelling, really. I mean, when you boil it right down, I was relying on a defence of the fact that this was a Public Sector Equality Duty that had been missed, that there wasn’t a – let’s face it – quite a bureaucratic document done, an EQIA. But there was no law I could lean on to say, well, this is an indigenous community of Scotland who have been travelling for the past thousand years, who have faced major structural discrimination and major environmental racism, meaning that their traditional way of life has been curtailed and so they’re forced to stay on this abandoned airfield because all their ancestral camps are blocked off. There was no legal argument in that sense. So we end up having to rely on quite bureaucratic arguments, which I feel miss the emotion and miss the impact that Gypsy Travellers are telling us at the roadside.

Jen Ang

So you’ve quite vividly described for us how the law, both the substance of the law and also the process of the law, is a forceful barrier actually preventing Gypsy Travellers from living equal or even sort of, you know, positive flourishing lives in Scotland today. What is the role of law in the legal system in relation to a positive social movement that would affirm Gypsy Traveller rights? Or are there any ways in which you’re seeking to use the law as a tool to achieve greater equality, for this community?

Davie Donaldson

Yeah, a fantastic point and, one that really comes to, I guess, where I want us to move into the future. 

I think with the law, we need to recognise that the law is written by the majority. And so in most contexts all over the world, indigenous people tend to be either omitted from legislative protection or they’ve had to fight really, really hard for the protections that they have. But I also think that in Scotland, we’re at a really interesting point with the incorporation of the UNCRC, where we can start to think about some of these international agreements, where we can start to think about, you know, elements like CERD, you know, even the UN Declarations of the Rights of Indigenous People, something which, in principle the UK has signed up to, although there’s no kind of legal binding nature to it. But I think we can take another look at these kind of national frameworks and think about, well, where can we use these in a local context and where can they follow the same path as the UNCRC to become, you know, something we can rely on as arguments and in a court of law?

Jen Ang

Here Davie is talking about the ways in which the law can be used as a positive tool for change. He’s listing international human rights treaties like the UNCRC, which is known as the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the CERD, which is the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination. Davie also mentions the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, and he gives all of these as examples of international law that could be used positively, proactively to defend and extend people’s rights here in Scotland. 

So how might that work? 

Well, Davie goes on to say that the UNCRC, the Children’s Rights Convention, is on a path here in Scotland because we can rely on those arguments in courts of law. But he points out that the other two treaties, the CERD and the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, do not have a legal binding nature here. 

What does he mean by that? 

Well, these global international treaties are negotiated between states at the UN or Council of Europe level, and then they’re opened for adoption or ratification by individual states. However, even once a state has agreed to adopt, ratify or be bound by a treaty, for example, the UNCRC, that doesn’t mean that individual people within that state can rely directly on the rights in that treaty in a national court in a specific matter that affects them. For some states, and the UK is one of those, those states also need to take steps, or what we call national measures, to fulfil the promises they signed up to in adopting those international treaties. This most often means taking a step, such as passage of legislation or a new law by the UK Westminster Parliament or regional parliament or assembly. 

So, for example, although the UK ratified the UNCRC in 1991, no child in a court anywhere in the UK could directly rely on the rights in that treaty in a UK court until July 2024, when Scotland passed the UNCRC Incorporation (Scotland) Act, which only applies in Scotland to certain Scottish public authorities.

So Davie is talking about a new opportunity to protect the rights of Gypsy Traveller families, which has arisen because of the passage of the UNCRC Incorporation (Scotland) Act. And we have actually seen this come to pass in the last few years. In late 2025/early 2026, the legal charity JustRight Scotland successfully defended an attempted eviction by Glasgow City Council of a family of travelling showpeople, relying in part on human rights arguments, including a legal argument about the impact for a child living on the site with reference to the UNCRC Incorporation (Scotland) Act. 

Davie goes on to acknowledge, however, that the CERD and the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People are not yet incorporated in UK law. Although the UK ratified the third in 1969, it has never taken any steps to incorporate its provisions here. The closest we’ve come is a draft Scottish Human Rights Bill, expected to be introduced in the 2026 Scottish Parliamentary session, which would directly incorporate aspects of CERD in Scotland in a similar manner to how the UNCRC act currently works. 

Finally, with regard to the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People, the previous Conservative UK government in 2023 has said “the UK supports the provisions in the Declaration. Human rights are universal and apply equally to all. Our position remains that national minority groups and other ethnic groups within the territory of the United Kingdom and its overseas territories do not fall within the scope of indigenous people to which the Declaration applies.” 

Davie continues explaining why it is vital for this perception to change both in the minds of policymakers and for the wider public.

Davie Donaldson

Now, I think on one level, you have those tools and the legal system should really embrace some of those and recognise that they do matter in this context. I mean, for a lot of people in the legal system, indigenous rights is not something on their kind of periphery even in Scotland, because they just don’t see it as a legal system or a legal framework which is useful in a British mentality. But actually they need to start to recognise that Gypsy Traveller communities, particularly Scottish Gypsy Travellers, you know, we can significantly prove that they are an indigenous community to Scotland, and likewise other communities. So I think we need to start thinking about how we incorporate those frameworks, but I also think we need to start to see representation in the legal system of our own peoples. Because I think when you see someone who knows how to navigate the system, who perhaps is a solicitor or working in the justice sector in some capacity, you start to recognise, well, actually this system isn’t just a weapon against me, but actually it’s something we can also use to protect ourselves. 

And that’s something which is significantly lacking for Gypsy Travellers. There are Gypsy Travellers who have went on and became solicitors and, that has happened. But the difficulty with that is that for those people, they’ve had to deliberately hide their ethnicity to such a degree in order to get to that stage, whether it be even to get to university or to get a job or get a traineeship even, they’ve had to hide that part of themselves to such a level where the community no longer know them or they’re known by the community, but they, the community are worried to put their jobs at risk by asking them to kind of take a platform on behalf of Gypsy Traveller rights.

So we need to see the legal system also change internally to think about, well, how do we respect marginalised people in this profession? How do we think about race? And, you know, even I’ve got close friends who are solicitors. And even the abuse that LGBT people face in the legal system is profound. And on an everyday level, Gypsy Travellers often look at the LGBT movement as an example of, you know, success, right. You know, you went from this place of being illegal to having pride marches, you know, and that’s something that is really visibly a success for marginalised communities. But again, when we look at the legal profession, it’s just so far behind the rest of society and in that capacity. 

So I think there’s representation, there’s the incorporation of different legal frameworks, but there’s also the fact that we need to think about relationships between legal professions and Gypsy Traveller communities. Gypsy Traveller communities don’t deal with institutions, they deal with people. And by that I mean, if anyone listening to this has ever worked with Gypsy Traveller communities, they very rarely know where you’re coming from. They don’t particularly care. You can tell them, but they don’t particularly care. They’ll know you by name, right? They know Sheila or they know Stephen or they know a person, they know that Stephen or Sheila works with the legal profession in some way and that they can help, but that’s it. Because they are inherently relationship based. And that goes back to our own indigenous kind of worldviews, around people and place and the fact that personal relationships are more important than anything. So we need to start seeing those personal relationships founded between marginalised communities, particularly Gypsy Travellers and solicitors. We need to start seeing people having a bit of patience. 

There’s also a recognition that by the time, for example, take an eviction, by the time an eviction goes to court and perhaps all the paperwork has been done for legal aid or whatever it may be, the Gypsy Travellers might no longer need to stay there anymore. They might have moved on in their traditional travelling pattern or they might have faced so much hostility that they just cannot, for their own mental health and their own family safety, stay there any longer. And that often faces a little bit of backlash from the legal profession because they think, well, you know, we’ve went to all this effort, we’ve done all this paperwork, we’ve formed all this argumentation, we’ve got all these documents into the court, which I totally get, but I guess there’s a lack of understanding around the transient nature of place as well. And that’s something where I think the current legal system has been built, particularly around evictions, on an assumption that the families will want to stay there long-term. 

So we need to start seeing all of those kind of, at times divergent stratas of work coming together to try and create a fairer justice system. But we also just need to, the very base level, have a better awareness for communities, you know, legal – and then this is an argument I wanted to get to but – legal argumentation is something that’s very difficult to do if you’re just a grassroots campaigner or a grassroots advocate without legal training. If you have done it long enough, like I have, you eventually start to learn some of the legal processes. But it’s a very closed shop, right. Solicitors aren’t overly keen to diverge all of it and they’re very keen to speak in language that’s quite inaccessible for your everyday person. And I think that also it creates this dependent nature from marginalised communities on the legal system and particularly legal professionals. There’s very little opportunity for Gypsy Traveller families who are stuck in these situations of cyclical eviction or facing human rights abuses as well, at the sharper end of things, to learn their rights, to think, well, actually this lawyer made X, Y and Z argument and I can use those myself, come the next time this is going to happen to me. And I think if we had that level of empowerment instead of the closed shop around, you know, what rights are, then we would start to see the public at large and also landowners and authorities start to question their actions prior to them doing it and prior to them retraumatising families because they’ll have the recognition that families know their rights. Families aren’t just going to allow people to evict them and tow their homes off of a piece of land without the proper documentation being done, or have the wool pulled over their eyes. 

In the case of that recent eviction on Crown Estate land, there was an argument in the interlocutor that the families were staying on a location that had unexploded munitions from the Second World War, therefore there was a safety risk. Now, on the very base reading of that, you think, well, completely like that’s fine, like, yeah, the eviction should go ahead because the families are at risk. And yeah, I completely get that. You know, it’s not a personal thing, this is about safety. But interestingly, the appendix which showed the survey data, was missing. And when we actually researched into the survey, we found that a recent survey that had been done found no munitions on that place that was being occupied at all. So again, the wool gets pulled over family’s eyes, right? 

And I think if there was more investment into the empowerment of communities long term, we would start to see that shift. So it’s multifaceted. There’s a lot of different things that need to happen for the legal system to be more just. But I also think we need to start to see Gypsy Travellers really treated with a degree of respect, you know, and common sense. You know, for example, the solicitor which put a 24-hour period on responding to that interlocutor who, you know, we had to hand deliver the letter, a bit of common sense would have shown that, well actually that’s going to be impossible for that family. So I think we need to start see those questions being asked as well and not just the harsh rule of law being applied at every stage.

Jen Ang

So I mean, you know, true to the legendary advocate that you are, a wide range of powerful challenges for the legal profession and for the justice system. I particularly heard the idea that there will be a consistent gap actually in the legal system’s ability to recognise and uphold the dignity of Gypsy Travellers unless there is greater representation and representation of people in their whole identities, perhaps with a structure that allows them to do this work that you were doing so effectively but as an advocate. So really a lot for us to think about. You’ve, you’ve sketched out powerfully where we’re going wrong and so, my last big question for you is hopefully a nice one to answer and that is, if we get it right, what does justice look like for you or for your community?

Davie Donaldson

Yeah. And it’s a question that I ask myself every time I visit a camp or every time that I’m speaking to someone who’s just experienced hate crime or someone who is terrified of losing their kids to social services and just doesn’t know how to go about even challenging decisions, right. 

And because of that, I think justice is something which is experienced on a really individual level. Justice is something that really relies upon former experience. It relies upon an acknowledgement of past trauma. both collective and individual. But it also recognises that everyone has a right to live in a dignified and respected way. Right. And that’s where our justice system falls short. Right, let’s pull it right back. I mean, I’m really keen to talk about legal arguments and legal frameworks, but at the very baseline of all of this is the fact that everybody in Scotland should be allowed to live respectfully and in a dignified way. 

And for Gypsy Travellers that means we want to experience our culture, our indigenous culture that’s been passed down by our ancestors for generation after generation. We want to ensure that our children and the next generation get to hear the stories and the songs which link us to the landscape. It’s about knowing where you come from, learning your language, having the ability to come together as a community and experience your own sense of identity and your own sense of belonging. Currently, the justice system in Scotland is a barrier to all of that. 

Now, how justice would look would be a Gypsy Traveller family would be able to travel unimpeded to their ancestral stopping places. There would be significant and sustained support for Gypsy Travellers travelling – and “shifting”  is our word for that  – but shifting around the country, basic support, access to basic sanitation, access to running water, access to refuse collection and bins, toilets, you know, really basic human needs should be met in a just society. 

We should recognise and respect that there are very few nomadic communities left in the world, particularly in the Western world, and so having a nomadic community in Scotland, like the Gypsy Travellers, is something that should be celebrated, it shouldn’t be impeded, right. I mean, living in a nomadic way, having a particular unique relationship to the landscape and the oral heritage of the land, is something that we should all want to celebrate, whether or not we are Gypsy Travellers. And to be able to travel and not worry about eviction, not have that constant stress, that constant feeling of surveillance every single time you move, knowing that local settled communities will respect your right to be there and will support you to be there in a safe and dignified manner. You know, they won’t expect you to have to remove all of your rubbish and travel from place to place with these cartloads of rubbish because you can’t access a council recycling facility. Because if you burn the rubbish, you’ll get charged, because you aren’t provided any bins. You know, they don’t expect you to have the toilet behind a hedge because they won’t provide you toilets, or they’ll lock the public toilets so you don’t access them, or they’ll refuse to allow you access to toilets in a local shop. Dignity, you know, that’s what the justice system should look like. 

And I think if we move to a place where there are legal protections on the right for Gypsy Travellers to travel, it won’t only positively impact the Gypsy traveller community, but it’ll positively impact the settled community as well, because it’ll allow that travelling to be done in a safer, more community-cohesive way. And it’ll avoid a lot of the common issues that we see, dragged up time and time again as argumentation against shifting. 

Now, this shouldn’t be against an indigenous community. You know, the argument shouldn’t be whether or not we still have Travellers travelling. The argument should be how do we, as a modern developed society, ensure that Indigenous communities can live dignified and respectfully. How can we recognise, like the First Minister did very recently with his apology to Gypsy Traveller communities, how can we recognise the historical trauma that as a collective mainstream society we have placed on this Indigenous community for generations? You know, where can we sit amongst all of this? 

So on one level there’s, there’s the kind of collective culture and justice, but I also think that when it comes to justice, we need to think about accessibility much more. We need to think about, for that Gypsy Traveller mother who is about to lose our kids because they’ve not been at school long enough or they’ve been removed from school in order to travel, what support was there for her to be able to access education for her children? What support is there for her to be able to navigate the social services in a way that supports her family to stay intact? And if her family is fragmented, what support is there for that child to then grow up knowing about its heritage and its identity as a Gypsy Traveller? Because right now there are gaps in all of that.

So the justice system is one that is a weaponised mechanism in Scotland and it’s certainly weaponised and has been written in many cases to be weaponised against Indigenous communities at home and abroad. But right now we’re starting to see, I guess, the cultural trauma, the transgenerational impact of, forced sedentarisation or forced removal coming to the fore. 

And really we’re at a crucial time. You know, if the justice system doesn’t become just in the next generation, we are going to lose Gypsy Travellers as we know them because there are no ancestral camps left. The families are consistently being pushed to the margins. Many families will report saying we can’t travel anymore because there’s nowhere safe to stop. Nowhere. The locations where we have ancestral memory, where we have a sense of belonging, have been blocked off for so long now that many families grow up not knowing their connection to the landscape because they’ve not been able to experience and inhabit that land in the way that their forebears have. So really, in the next generation we’re going to see a real crisis point for our community where… I believe Gypsy Travellers will always exist, but being able to be a nomadic or even semi-nomadic community in Scotland, being able to experience our language and our oral histories, being able to experience our sense of community and belonging as we know now is really coming to the stage where we need to do something, otherwise we’re going to lose that forever.

Jen Ang

A thoughtful and urgent and powerful critique, I think And I recently read an article that you had republished, I think about sacred spaces to the Gypsy Traveller community. And it struck me as, you know, as someone who loves driving across Scotland as well and walking in its wilderness, it struck me how sad it is that our collective understanding of those spaces is so poor and actually that that was the result of really an intentional erasure and oppressing of that history. 

But in any event I am so heartened that you for one are continuing to work in this area and of stridently defend the possibility that we can get this right for the next generation, that it’s not too late, but also that there are people with hearts and hands and minds who are willing to put their hand to the wheel. So there’s so much more that I want to hear from you Davie, but I’m also conscious that I need to let you away.

Davie Donaldson

Yeah, no, I guess just to Because it was a bit of a do or not, wasn’t it? But I want to also say that you know there is, there is a lot of resilience in the community, you know, and adaptability. Right. And I mean Tyson Fury, right, who’s not the biggest champion for many causes, however, he did say one thing that I agreed with, just the one: he said that as a Gypsy man, he could be taken butt naked and dropped in the middle of the rainforest with no resources, with nothing and he would come out a month later a millionaire with a dead chinchilla on his head. 

And you know it’s a bit tongue-in-cheek but it speaks to that adaptability of Gypsy Traveller communities. You know, it’s never been legal for our people to exist ever. You know, I mean we can go right back to the early dawn of, of kind of the mediaeval literature that we can read and the legal landscape and see. Well, you know, there was a benign neglect toward Gypsy Travellers at that time at best, right. But there’s never been a legal right to travel, but our people have continued to do it. So there is an adaptability and a resilience to navigate legal system. 

I guess what I want to really end with is the fact that this generation of lawmakers, whether they be, you know, legal professionals or people who want to influence the legal system or even advocates and campaigners like me, we need to see a responsibility on their shoulders to think, well this potentially is the last generation of lawmaking that we have where we can really protect Gypsy Traveller communities as we know them and ensure that the next generation can grow up, not just Gypsy Travellers, but experiencing the whole culture and their whole sense of belonging. 

There was a quote from one of our most famous ballad singers, Bill Stewart, who was an advocate in her own right. She was, you know, celebrated by royalty. She, you know, performed for politicians and whatever it may be. But she was, well known within the community as Granny. Everyone knew her as Granny, right? but she was once asked by a journalist, and the journalist said, when do you think Travellers will cease to exist? When do you think they’ll disappear? You know, you’re an older Traveller, there’s not many people like you. – And this was in the 90s, right? – There’s not many people like you anymore are still singing the old ballads, the old Travellers, you know, when, when will it die? Will it die with you? And she laughed and she’s quoted as saying, son, Travellers will be with us until doomsday in the afternoon. And I think that shows such an act of resilience and humility as well from our elders in our community that I think the legal system can really learn from, but also respect that there is a responsibility placed by that quote on all of our shoulders to ensure that Travellers are here until doomsday in the afternoon.

Jen Ang

A strong and beautiful reminder of the depth of this history, but also of the urgency of the work that needs to be done. 

So I’m going to very cheekily ask you one final question. I know that you need to go, but there will be people who are listening to this series of podcasts, who would be human rights activists, maybe also lawyers, and who are looking at you and who you are and what you’ve accomplished today. 

They might be a younger version of you, or they might actually want to be you, Davie. So my question is, what advice might you have for someone listening today, who wants to know what it takes to get to where you’ve gotten to.

Davie Donaldson

To put it in a different way, an activist who I look up to in the civil rights movement is Harry Belafonte, right? And he’s famously quoted as saying, “I became an activist because I grew up in poverty,” right? And I think for me, that is a situation… I never chose to be an activist or a campaigner or an advocate or whatever title I place on whatever it is that I do, right? But I grew up as a Gypsy Traveller in Scotland, and I think, by that experience, I recognised that something needed to change so that the next generation didn’t grow up in the way that I did, right? 

So I think for anyone out there who is thinking about becoming a human rights defender or, you know, whether that be at the grassroots level as a community campaigner, as an advocate, as a human rights lawyer even, and, you know, moving into the legal profession, I think do it, right? If you’ve got that calling in you, then there’s something in your lived experience which recognises injustice as injustice, right? And that’s, that’s the basic point of it. You know, you don’t need a particular degree – or you will if you want to be a lawyer, right? But in order to actually campaign on these things, I think it’s important to just have that base level of, here’s where I’m starting from, here’s what injustice looks like and here’s how it needs to change. And that basic human relationship with justice is something which we can all tap into, whether or not we’re legally trained. 

So what I would tell a younger version of myself is: what you’re seeing around you right now doesn’t have to be that way, right? It doesn’t have to be that way. You don’t need to experience the evictions that you’ve experienced. You don’t need to experience the hate, the discrimination, the… the barriers to your culture, to accessing the voices of your ancestors. You don’t need to experience that. And you have the tools, everyone does, in order to move forward and to change that for the next generation and for yourself. You know, let’s… let’s move into a place where we’re not just thinking about fifty, sixty, you know, hundred years, potentially down the line, you know, and the descendants to come. 

Oftentimes indigenous communities, we fall into that perspective of, yeah, we’re doing this for the future. And it’s this quite indistinguishable, ungraspable future, right? Let’s do it for ourselves. You know, why can’t things change now? Why can’t we lead dialogue and conversation which can impact our communities and our families now? And why do we have to face these indignities and sacrifice our own sense of belonging, our own sense of justice, in order for the future? We shouldn’t have to sacrifice that. Let’s claim justice today and make sure that we ourselves can also experience what we believe justice should look like.

Jen Ang

And that’s a wrap for today’s episode with Davie Donaldson, award-winning advocate for the Traveller community here in Scotland, relational facilitator and commentator and podcast host for the BBC. 

If you are inspired by what Davie has shared and want to learn more, please do have a listen to his most recent podcast projects, his work at Cognac Advocacy and learn more about how you can help combat discrimination against Indigenous peoples local to you. Find out about the history of your local area. Explore connections and histories that have been hidden, suppressed or lost that you could help to revive like Davie does. This is the first step towards recognising the equal dignity, belonging and the rights of all people who live here. 

We will be back again soon with our next episode, a one-to-one interview with the brilliant Talat Yaqoob, a feminist activist and political commentator and co-chair of the First Minister’s National Advisory Council for Women and Girls in Scotland. She will share with us a timely take on the relationship between law and inequality and highlight some of the key challenges facing the new Scottish Government in 2026. 

Thanks for tuning in to our Lawmanity podcast again and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please do hit the like and subscribe buttons and share our episodes with friends and colleagues who might enjoy learning a little bit more about how law really works in practice and how it can be used to make the world a better, brighter place. 

The Lawmanity podcast is co-produced by me, your host Jen Ang, and by the brilliant and talented Natalia Uribe. Shout out to Helena Refai for mentoring us through our first year of this incredible project. And thanks also to Amanda Amaeshi, on graphics and socials. The music you’ve been listening to is Always On The Move by Musicians in Exile, a Glasgow-based music project led by people seeking refuge in Scotland. Thanks so much for tuning in today. We hope you enjoyed listening and see you next time.

Host: Jen Ang

Quote: Amanda Amaeshi

“Issues of equality and justice can easily be sidelined in terms of self-interested party politics. But justice has to be braver than that. It has to put people and their dignity at the centre.”

Background music lyrics:

“We’re musicians in exile and this is the song of hope saying…”

Jen Ang

Welcome to the Lawmanity podcast where we explore the complex relationship between law and activism and discuss the different ways that law can oppress but can also lead to real social change. 

I’m Jen Ang, a human rights lawyer and activist based in Scotland and your host on the Lawmanity podcast. We’re back this week with more one-to-one guest interviews. And kicking things off is today’s interview with Amanda Amaeshi: activist, law graduate and – as announced a couple of weeks ago – Lawmanity’s new Legal Caseworker. 

Amanda writes and campaigns on gender equality, anti-racism and youth political participation. Her advocacy journey began as a Year of Young Person 2018 Ambassador and a member of the Girlguiding UK Advocate Panel. For her work, Amanda has won numerous awards including the Young Women’s Movement 30 Under 30 list for 2020, the Glasgow Times Young Scotswoman of the Year award in 2021 and in November 2024 she was named My Life My Say’s Next Generation Changemaker of the Year. 

Last year Amanda graduated with an LLB from the University College London. She currently serves as a trustee for the Young Women’s Movement and until recently – alongside me – as a member of the First Minister’s Advisory Council for Women and Girls in Scotland. 

I’m delighted to welcome Amanda to the show today, and also to her new role as Legal Caseworker at Lawmanity.

Jen Ang

Just to get us started or warmed up, I have a kind of surprise opener question which was indeed a surprise for you today, and it is this: so a good friend of mine told me that our sense of smell is our oldest sense as a species, because it connects really quickly to deep memories that we might have of a place or a time. So I like to ask people, what is a smell that is meaningful to you? Maybe one that you like or one that just, you know, takes you to a place in your memories or your imagination that you like to go to?

Amanda Amaeshi

I thought this was quite a funny question because I notoriously have quite a bad sense of smell! But, I was trying to think of something quite recent, actually I went, I went to this candle-making session at UCL East with my friend a couple weeks ago. So we got to make our own candles. And I remember the scent that I picked out was like chamomile and lavender, I think. And I just really liked that smell. And I thought it was quite peaceful and it was a really nice, relaxing activity to do with my friend in the midst of assessment season, all these deadlines, all the stress, and also because I made the candle for my mum, so I just felt this is something that she really likes. It was kind of like that combination of doing the nice, fun activity and then also making something that would be for someone that’s really meaningful to me. It brings back lots of nice memories.

Jen Ang

Oh, that’s lovely. Those are such soothing smells, aren’t they? Very much. It reminds me of, I have a sleeping time tea and chamomile lavender is very much a part of that.

Amanda Amaeshi

Yeah. Because I know my mum really likes chamomile tea. So I felt like she would like it. And I mean, she did like it. She was really delighted when I brought it back.

Jen Ang

Oh, star gift. Star gift and lucky mum. Thank you so much for sharing that. 

So now we’re going to turn from fun opener into kind of, you know, why we’re here. Ah, so the first question, it’s a big one. Okay, so the first question is basically, do you feel that the law treats you or your community equally? So does it work equally for you or your community, however you wish to define that and why or why not?

Amanda Amaeshi

I was thinking about this, I thought about my community as like… I’m a young Black woman, so I was thinking about it through those lenses of youth, of race, of gender. And I mean, there’ll be plenty of ways where the law does work, but, I focused on examples where I found that it hasn’t worked so well. 

And, one of the first things that came to mind is just how the legal system is failing survivors of gender-based violence in regards to their access to justice is being denied because – legal aid is technically available for these cases [but] – nearly a third of survivors were forced to represent themselves in courts in 2023, which has nearly doubled since 2011. And this means that survivors are having to navigate these complex, and often retraumatising, legal processes, and they have to face their abusers without that legal representation. And also Rape Crisis England & Wales has also raised concerns about how the asylum system retraumatises survivors of sexual violence, particularly those who are housed in unsafe and unsuitable accommodations by the Home Office. This shows the overlap between gender and then race and migration status as well. And whilst these people are trying to face or trying to seek protection, they’re met with these systems who are then compounding their trauma rather than alleviating it. 

Another thing that I found was in regards to policing, policing is actually one of the first things that came to mind because anytime I see police in the street, even though I’ve never personally had a bad experience, just instinctively because I know about the rates of over-policing in Black communities, I always feel a bit unsettled whenever I see them about… but there’s been civil orders like the Serious Violence Reduction Orders which have been disproportionately targeting Black communities and particularly Black men.

Jen Ang

That is a long and sobering list of really poignant I suppose statistics just to illustrate the wide range of ways in which the law may not equally protect or equally support women. You’ve highlighted as a community, so women survivors of violence but also Black communities and migrant communities.

Do you then as an activist and a law student, you know, knowing that the law doesn’t treat communities that you care about equally, do you see the law as more of a tool or a barrier for change or maybe a little bit of both?

Amanda Amaeshi

I think it’s definitely both. Like it’s a barrier and a tool.

In regards to being a tool obviously people go to court, have a case and especially with cases of like strategic litigation where individual cases can be leveraged to advocate for wider legal precedents that can address broader systemic issues. And there’s also legal protections embedded in anti-discrimination legislation like the Equality Act for example, which equality is in the name. So I suppose in that sense it’s definitely a tool but I think it can also be a barrier as well. 

So firstly in regards to the practical barriers, so I thought about this through – I’ve volunteered over the past year at UCL’s Integrated Legal Advice Clinic. So it’s located in East London in Stratford and the clinic offers legal aid and also pro bono support in regards to housing, welfare benefits, community care and education. And so I had the opportunity to volunteer there both as an admin volunteer and also through one of my final year modules which is called Access to Justice and Community Engagement. So I got to help out the lawyers with their casework.  

So I guess thinking about that experience, it really illuminated for me the practical, barriers that come with accessing law. 

First off, to do with the cost: the fact that so many people are having to access legal clinics like UCL’s iLAC, it shows that just accessing legal support is really prohibitive if private legal services are charging exorbitant fees and it just becomes really inaccessible. 

And then even where obviously Legal Aid does exist and the aim of that is supposed to be to provide access for those who otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford it, Legal Aid is being slashed. There’s been lots of cuts and it’s had a major impact on the sustainability and Legal Aid sector. And as a result I’ve seen that there are relatively few services offering free legal assistance, especially when it comes to ongoing support or representation beyond initial advice. And the limited numbers of clinics that do exist, like UCL’s iLAC are often inundated with inquiries and they have no option to signpost clients elsewhere. And especially when I was working on the telephones, answering client enquiries, I found myself having to do this a lot, having to do some research to find other places that the enquirers could go to. But then it also becomes a kind of inescapable loop because I remember quite a lot of the times I would say, “oh, maybe you can go here or you can go here”. And then the enquirer would be like, “oh, I’ve already been there and they already didn’t have capacity and in fact they were the ones that told me to come to you”. It almost becomes a bit hopeless. You’re kind of just going round and round in circles

And if you are lucky enough to get that support, there’s then so much bureaucracy and opaqueness within the legal system. Statutes, regulations, guidance, it’s often difficult to find and even more difficult to understand, lots of technical language. And I remember I was helping out with the casework, having to come up with legal arguments and I’d spend ages reading these documents. And even for me as a law student and even talking to the other lawyers as well, it wouldn’t always be so straightforward to figure out what does this mean? So if it’s already difficult for those of us who have some experience already with the law, then how much more difficult would it be for those who are in a legal crisis and then in a heightened state of vulnerability and perhaps with other compounding inequalities on top of do with race or disability or age, how are they supposed to navigate this system? 

And sometimes, maybe I’m being a bit cynical, but it also sometimes seems that this opaqueness and difficulty to navigate the system is not just a flaw, but kind of a purposeful design. I remember there was a client we had once needed to challenge a decision, regarding the Department for Work and Pensions. And the deadline for submitting the application to challenge the decision had technically passed. But the lawyer who was supervising me said that appeal could probably still be made because of exceptional circumstances, in this case to do with recent house moves and disability-related difficulties. It raised the question for me of who gets the benefit of this procedural flexibility? And the fact that late appeals could be accepted suggested to me that deadlines could function more as deterrence as opposed to absolute cutoffs, which could potentially discourage claimants who assume that they have no further options after they’ve gotten this decision.

And if there is this flexibility in regards to extenuating circumstances, why isn’t this more explicitly communicated? Why is this something that claimants actually have to fight for and in this case fighting for with the support of the legal professionals? It’d be even worse if the claimant was trying to do it by themselves. It almost seemed that the system is designed in a way that if there are fewer, challenges and it becomes like a more manageable caseload. But that’s not how justice is supposed to work, is it?

Jen Ang

As I listened to you talk about your experience at the UCL clinic, I mean, what you’ve described feels very, very familiar. in terms of my own observations from frontline advice, work and legal casework, all of those frustrations around potential clients not being able to find anyone to help them. So just a total lack of access to advice. But then also raising that question about whether access to justice, of the law working unequally for people is not just kind of an accident or not just because of quote, like barriers, like capacity barriers, but whether there’s actually something baked into the way that some of the process works.

Amanda Amaeshi

I mean there have definitely been good things as well. It’s been really, throughout my year of volunteering nurse, it was also really great to just see how many people the clinic were able to help in terms of getting a case outcome that was desirable or even just the clients feeling more confident and empowered to advocate for their rights and for the rights of their community. 

I remember actually getting a phone call from a client, her case had actually been resolved and she was actually saying, oh, someone else from her community had a similar issue. And she knew because her lawyer that she had at iLAC had really empowered her, really given the confidence, not just the practical advice of what to do, but also just making her feel heard and respected, that she knew, I have to send my friend here as well, because they were able to help me, maybe they can help her as well, my friend as well. So there’s definitely positive sides to it as well.

Jen Ang

That leads nicely on to my next question, which is, in light of what you’ve seen and learned, what do you think is the role of lawyers and the legal system in supporting social justice movements? Just bearing in mind that when we talk about the law and the legal system, both the actors within the system and also our opponents in the system are all lawyers. So it’s a broader question, for you, what do you think is their role?

Amanda Amaeshi

This question really, drew my mind back to some conversations I’ve been having during the seminars that I’ve had as part of the Access to Justice module. This idea of, what are lawyers supposed to do? Are they supposed to simply just advocate for their client in regards to how the law currently is, or is there kind of like a broader role as well of like, advocating for social justice? And I think it was called cause lawyering. And so that’s what this question really got me to think about. 

And I remember coming across a quote when I was reading, from an academic called James Douglas. And he said that a lawyer’s role in society is not to change the rules of the game, but to assist in maintaining the rules and to help resolve conflicts established under the rules. And I guess to an extent I can kind of, I can understand the logic behind the view. Like, it reflects a very traditional procedural understanding of the legal profession. And basically lawyers keep the system stable and functional by working within the rules that currently exist and in theory it makes the law predictable and fair and perhaps would increase public trust. Especially since lawyers are supposed to be seen as neutral figures to represent their clients, not to advance their personal ideologies. So it would ensure that everyone, no matter their background, can expect an objective and fair representation. And there’s also the constitutional argument that you don’t want lawyers or the judiciary to step over too much into what could be considered the role of legislators, like creating policy. 

But… so I think about these points and I get it, makes sense. I mean, it’s what I’ve been taught to think, from a very traditional law degree. But at the same time I also feel like it paints a fairly narrow picture of what the legal profession can be, because it assumes that the legal system is fixed and unchanging. But in reality it always evolves and sometimes I think it has to be challenged head-on when it fails to deliver justice. And I think lawyers are very uniquely placed, particularly those who are on the frontline of issues like housing or immigration, welfare or criminal justice. So in regards to housing and welfare, again I’m thinking back to the lawyers at the legal clinic. These lawyers in particular are often able to see the real-world effects of legal gaps and injustices and so then to suggest that their role is only to uphold the system no matter how flawed, it ignores the deep ethical questions that arise when the rules themselves are actually part of the access to justice problem. And laws, a lot of the time they aren’t just imperfect, they’re inherently outdated or harmful. Especially if they’re designed by decision makers that don’t have lived experience or don’t actively attempt to engage meaningfully with those with lived experience. So upholding these laws blindly, laws that are really outdated and harmful… in my view. It conflicts with the profession’s broader commitment to justice. Because if lawyers can’t or don’t challenge these unjust laws or practices, then, especially with their knowledge and their unique positioning, then who else will? And I think it is possible sometimes that lawyers can do both, still advocate for your client, but then also kind of pushing the boundaries when justice demands of it. 

So there’s another quote, from Jennifer Gordon, in her article ‘The Lawyer Is Not The Protagonist’. And then she outlines what she calls the conventional narrative, where a social problem arises, a lawyer steps in to fix it, the lawyer identifies the legal strategy, and either the case is won or lost. But I really liked how she challenged that whole framing and she offers an alternative view where the community group instead is the protagonist and the lawyer is instead part of the supporting cast. So the lawyer is not supposed to take over and be like, oh, ah, I’m the one that knows all the legal information, I’m the one that knows the fancy words, all the arguments. It’s not about that. So the question that the lawyer should be asking is not “how do I fix this?” But “what can legal tools do to support the broader strategy of the community?” And I thought it was really great rethinking because law can be used as a really good tool, but it’s not just law in isolation that could solve the big societal problems. Legal work has to be in service of a much bigger vision which is in line of collaborative community action, community-oriented actions as well… like getting rid of the top down solution, which is quite patronising I think and kind of like having the humility to lean in more to these grassroots movements and using law and using that legal expertise as one of many tools in a toolbox to help that process.

Jen Ang

That’s.. I’m sort of, I’m sort of in awe because that was first a very powerful critique of your view around the obligation of lawyers to think critically about whether to participate in injustice. And then a description of what movement lawyering or community lawyering could look like. That was really quite inspiring actually. It’s also a hopeful message for me to hear you describe that and to hear that vision as something that you think is possible or it’s possible for us to get better at moving towards. 

My last big question is a big question, and it’s this: in light of everything you’ve described about inequalities in the law itself, inequalities in access to the law and the role of lawyers, what for you does justice look like for you or your community?

Amanda Amaeshi

It’s a very big question. But I think it’s something that’s really important to think about because when it comes to dealing with problems it’s very easy to focus on the negatives and be like: oh we don’t like this, we don’t like this. But if you don’t have a clear idea of how do we want things to be instead then can be easy for the action that is happening to… fizzle out a little bit, without that kind of sustained hope of this is what we’re fighting for. 

But for me I’d say that justice looks like a legal system, a political system that is designed by, with and for the people that it aims to serve, especially those who are currently most vulnerable, most marginalised and furthest away from this power. And it’s not just about abstract legal principles which are in legislations or in courtroom decisions. But it’s really about whether the people at the sharpest edges of injustices feel seen, heard and protected. Like the example of like the clients from earlier where they felt heard and empowered in regards to their case. 

And it’s really important that justice has to be intersectional, it has to be collective, it has to be rooted in empathy. And it’s really important that these don’t just become buzzwords. They’re really essential core principles. And there has to be a commitment to listening to communities rather than just prescribing solutions based solely on labels that might be put on them by society. And I think especially the idea of empathy and humanity are really central to this vision. I think throughout my law degree, sometimes it’s kind of the case you have to focus on these, very quote unquote “intellectually serious” ideas, like rationality. But I think throughout the three years, especially in the modules that I’ve taken in final year, it’s really helped me understand this idea of empathy is transformative and it is as intellectually serious as any other idea. And, it’s a rigorous, necessary foundation for legal thinking and legal practice as well. 

And another thing, part of justice is that, something I see right now is that too often legal systems are shaped by fear. And I’m thinking about around the world, the rollback of rights under pressure from far-right movements and how as a result in Scotland and in the UK perhaps laws or policies are becoming a bit weaker in response to that. Issues of equality and justice can easily be sidelined in terms of self-interested party politics. But justice has to be braver than that. It has to put people and their dignity at the centre of the conversation. It can’t just be moved aside because it’s become politically inconvenient. It should always be at the core of what anybody’s doing. 

And as I’ve already alluded to, I don’t think that law alone can carry this burden of striving for justice. It’s definitely an important part. But, I think justice requires more than just legal reform. It needs moral imagination and sustained inclusive activism. And so law is a tool that must be wielded alongside storytelling, organising, mutual aid, education, care, all these other aspects. A lot of it comes from the community and I think that’s how real change and real justice happens.

Jen Ang

Amazing. I was almost again holding my breath, not wanting to interrupt you. But justice has to be, intersectional, collective, rooted in empathy. It has to come from the community. 

So my final, final question is, this: so the Lawmanity podcast will go out to all sorts of listeners and there will be some people out there who will be listening to your thoughts and what you’ve accomplished already as an activist and a law student, and will be wondering how you got here or maybe how to be you. 

So, my question is, what is your advice maybe for your younger self? And I know you’re still probably identifying as young! but you’re still a mentor to some, and if not your younger self, then to other people out there who are curious and who want to do some of the things you’ve been doing.

Amanda Amaeshi

This is a really lovely question and actually I remember last year I wrote an article all about this actually for The WOW Foundation, giving my advice to aspiring changemakers… and then the key points related to identifying one’s key interests and goals, finding the opportunities, building community, dealing with imposter syndrome – especially when you’re doing quite big roles like being on the National Advisory Council – and then also resisting that fear and apathy. So I would definitely encourage interested listeners to check that out. Perhaps that could be linked in the show notes. 

But I wanted to mention one other thing that I feel like I’ve not spoken about elsewhere before. Something new. Sometimes… especially when I’m thinking about younger me, maybe what 14, 15-year-old me would have wanted to hear when I first started doing this activism, advocacy stuff properly is that sometimes not everybody is going to understand why you care so much or why you want to do the actions that you’re doing. I mean, to be fair, a decent amount of people will, this is not to be off putting. I guess the reality is that some people might try to mock you, make fun of you, try to belittle you in the hopes that you might stop doing whatever it is that you’re doing and it can be quite disheartening to be honest. But I think it’s important to remember that advocating for change is never easy. And kind of like facing such remarks from other people is just one part of how it might not always be easy. But it’s really important to try not to let that get to you and just stay true to the value system that’s guiding you. Keep in your mind the changes that you wish to see, which again why I said that, think about the problems, we also have to think about the solutions as well, the ideal scenario, and keep in focus the changes that you wish to see which are possible. Don’t let anybody tell you otherwise and find yourself a community of changemakers who you can learn from, who you can seek support and solidarity from, and put in your best ability, and… don’t let other people’s small minds limit your imagination.

Jen Ang

Ah, that’s brilliant. Wise advice from a wise woman! 

Thank you for that and thank you for taking the time to sit down with me today, and to share with me your thoughts, which we’ll now get to share with a wider audience than just you and me. I could honestly sit and talk to you, Amanda, for, you know, another hour and have lots of questions about everything, but in the interest of letting you get on with your day, I’m going to draw the interview to a close here. But it’s been lovely to see you and I, and probably all of our listeners, will keep an eye out for what you do next because doubtless it will be just as bold and inspiring and interesting as today. 

And that’s a wrap for today’s episode with Amanda Amaeshi, activist, law graduate and my new colleague here at Lawmanity. If you were inspired by what Amanda has shared and want to learn more about the Legal Aid crisis that’s preventing survivors of domestic violence from accessing the legal advice they need, or if you want to explore what it means to be a community lawyer or a cause lawyer, check out the links in our episode notes. And for those of you who are practically minded, reach out to your local Women’s Aid and Rape Crisis organisation or your local Citizens Advice Bureau, educate yourself and others, and maybe consider volunteering. 

We’ll be back again soon with our next episode, an amazing one to one with Davie Donaldson, a young activist from the Scottish traveller community, who shares his perspective on the challenges of preserving and protecting travelling culture under laws that are written and enforced primarily by and for settled people. Davie vividly illustrates what it looks like day-to-day in his advocacy on behalf of his family and his community. 

Thanks for tuning in to our Lawmanity podcast again and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please do hit the like and subscribe buttons and share our episodes with friends and colleagues who might enjoy learning a little bit more about how law really works in practice and how it can be used to make the world a better, brighter place. 

The Lawmanity podcast is co-produced by me, your host Jen Ang, and by the brilliant and talented Natalia Uribe. Shout out to Helena Refai for mentoring us through our first year of this incredible project. And welcome to Amanda Amaeshi, who’s joined the team to support us with graphics and socials. The music you’ve been listening to is Always On The Move by Musicians in Exile, a Glasgow-based music project led by people seeking refuge in Scotland. Thanks so much for tuning in today. We hope you enjoyed listening and see you next time.

Quote: Amanda Amaeshi

“Issues of equality and justice can easily be sidelined in terms of self-interested party politics. But justice has to be braver than that. It has to put people and their dignity at the centre.”

Background music lyrics:

“We’re musicians in exile and this is the song of hope saying…”

Jen Ang

Welcome to the Lawmanity podcast where we explore the complex relationship between law and activism and discuss the different ways that law can oppress but can also lead to real social change. 

I’m Jen Ang, a human rights lawyer and activist based in Scotland and your host on the Lawmanity podcast. We’re back this week with more one-to-one guest interviews. And kicking things off is today’s interview with Amanda Amaeshi: activist, law graduate and – as announced a couple of weeks ago – Lawmanity’s new Legal Caseworker. 

Amanda writes and campaigns on gender equality, anti-racism and youth political participation. Her advocacy journey began as a Year of Young Person 2018 Ambassador and a member of the Girlguiding UK Advocate Panel. For her work, Amanda has won numerous awards including the Young Women’s Movement 30 Under 30 list for 2020, the Glasgow Times Young Scotswoman of the Year award in 2021 and in November 2024 she was named My Life My Say’s Next Generation Changemaker of the Year. 

Last year Amanda graduated with an LLB from the University College London. She currently serves as a trustee for the Young Women’s Movement and until recently – alongside me – as a member of the First Minister’s Advisory Council for Women and Girls in Scotland. 

I’m delighted to welcome Amanda to the show today, and also to her new role as Legal Caseworker at Lawmanity.

Jen Ang

Just to get us started or warmed up, I have a kind of surprise opener question which was indeed a surprise for you today, and it is this: so a good friend of mine told me that our sense of smell is our oldest sense as a species, because it connects really quickly to deep memories that we might have of a place or a time. So I like to ask people, what is a smell that is meaningful to you? Maybe one that you like or one that just, you know, takes you to a place in your memories or your imagination that you like to go to?

Amanda Amaeshi

I thought this was quite a funny question because I notoriously have quite a bad sense of smell! But, I was trying to think of something quite recent, actually I went, I went to this candle-making session at UCL East with my friend a couple weeks ago. So we got to make our own candles. And I remember the scent that I picked out was like chamomile and lavender, I think. And I just really liked that smell. And I thought it was quite peaceful and it was a really nice, relaxing activity to do with my friend in the midst of assessment season, all these deadlines, all the stress, and also because I made the candle for my mum, so I just felt this is something that she really likes. It was kind of like that combination of doing the nice, fun activity and then also making something that would be for someone that’s really meaningful to me. It brings back lots of nice memories.

Jen Ang

Oh, that’s lovely. Those are such soothing smells, aren’t they? Very much. It reminds me of, I have a sleeping time tea and chamomile lavender is very much a part of that.

Amanda Amaeshi

Yeah. Because I know my mum really likes chamomile tea. So I felt like she would like it. And I mean, she did like it. She was really delighted when I brought it back.

Jen Ang

Oh, star gift. Star gift and lucky mum. Thank you so much for sharing that. 

So now we’re going to turn from fun opener into kind of, you know, why we’re here. Ah, so the first question, it’s a big one. Okay, so the first question is basically, do you feel that the law treats you or your community equally? So does it work equally for you or your community, however you wish to define that and why or why not?

Amanda Amaeshi

I was thinking about this, I thought about my community as like… I’m a young Black woman, so I was thinking about it through those lenses of youth, of race, of gender. And I mean, there’ll be plenty of ways where the law does work, but, I focused on examples where I found that it hasn’t worked so well. 

And, one of the first things that came to mind is just how the legal system is failing survivors of gender-based violence in regards to their access to justice is being denied because – legal aid is technically available for these cases [but] – nearly a third of survivors were forced to represent themselves in courts in 2023, which has nearly doubled since 2011. And this means that survivors are having to navigate these complex, and often retraumatising, legal processes, and they have to face their abusers without that legal representation. And also Rape Crisis England & Wales has also raised concerns about how the asylum system retraumatises survivors of sexual violence, particularly those who are housed in unsafe and unsuitable accommodations by the Home Office. This shows the overlap between gender and then race and migration status as well. And whilst these people are trying to face or trying to seek protection, they’re met with these systems who are then compounding their trauma rather than alleviating it. 

Another thing that I found was in regards to policing, policing is actually one of the first things that came to mind because anytime I see police in the street, even though I’ve never personally had a bad experience, just instinctively because I know about the rates of over-policing in Black communities, I always feel a bit unsettled whenever I see them about… but there’s been civil orders like the Serious Violence Reduction Orders which have been disproportionately targeting Black communities and particularly Black men.

Jen Ang

That is a long and sobering list of really poignant I suppose statistics just to illustrate the wide range of ways in which the law may not equally protect or equally support women. You’ve highlighted as a community, so women survivors of violence but also Black communities and migrant communities.

Do you then as an activist and a law student, you know, knowing that the law doesn’t treat communities that you care about equally, do you see the law as more of a tool or a barrier for change or maybe a little bit of both?

Amanda Amaeshi

I think it’s definitely both. Like it’s a barrier and a tool.

In regards to being a tool obviously people go to court, have a case and especially with cases of like strategic litigation where individual cases can be leveraged to advocate for wider legal precedents that can address broader systemic issues. And there’s also legal protections embedded in anti-discrimination legislation like the Equality Act for example, which equality is in the name. So I suppose in that sense it’s definitely a tool but I think it can also be a barrier as well. 

So firstly in regards to the practical barriers, so I thought about this through – I’ve volunteered over the past year at UCL’s Integrated Legal Advice Clinic. So it’s located in East London in Stratford and the clinic offers legal aid and also pro bono support in regards to housing, welfare benefits, community care and education. And so I had the opportunity to volunteer there both as an admin volunteer and also through one of my final year modules which is called Access to Justice and Community Engagement. So I got to help out the lawyers with their casework.  

So I guess thinking about that experience, it really illuminated for me the practical, barriers that come with accessing law. 

First off, to do with the cost: the fact that so many people are having to access legal clinics like UCL’s iLAC, it shows that just accessing legal support is really prohibitive if private legal services are charging exorbitant fees and it just becomes really inaccessible. 

And then even where obviously Legal Aid does exist and the aim of that is supposed to be to provide access for those who otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford it, Legal Aid is being slashed. There’s been lots of cuts and it’s had a major impact on the sustainability and Legal Aid sector. And as a result I’ve seen that there are relatively few services offering free legal assistance, especially when it comes to ongoing support or representation beyond initial advice. And the limited numbers of clinics that do exist, like UCL’s iLAC are often inundated with inquiries and they have no option to signpost clients elsewhere. And especially when I was working on the telephones, answering client enquiries, I found myself having to do this a lot, having to do some research to find other places that the enquirers could go to. But then it also becomes a kind of inescapable loop because I remember quite a lot of the times I would say, “oh, maybe you can go here or you can go here”. And then the enquirer would be like, “oh, I’ve already been there and they already didn’t have capacity and in fact they were the ones that told me to come to you”. It almost becomes a bit hopeless. You’re kind of just going round and round in circles

And if you are lucky enough to get that support, there’s then so much bureaucracy and opaqueness within the legal system. Statutes, regulations, guidance, it’s often difficult to find and even more difficult to understand, lots of technical language. And I remember I was helping out with the casework, having to come up with legal arguments and I’d spend ages reading these documents. And even for me as a law student and even talking to the other lawyers as well, it wouldn’t always be so straightforward to figure out what does this mean? So if it’s already difficult for those of us who have some experience already with the law, then how much more difficult would it be for those who are in a legal crisis and then in a heightened state of vulnerability and perhaps with other compounding inequalities on top of do with race or disability or age, how are they supposed to navigate this system? 

And sometimes, maybe I’m being a bit cynical, but it also sometimes seems that this opaqueness and difficulty to navigate the system is not just a flaw, but kind of a purposeful design. I remember there was a client we had once needed to challenge a decision, regarding the Department for Work and Pensions. And the deadline for submitting the application to challenge the decision had technically passed. But the lawyer who was supervising me said that appeal could probably still be made because of exceptional circumstances, in this case to do with recent house moves and disability-related difficulties. It raised the question for me of who gets the benefit of this procedural flexibility? And the fact that late appeals could be accepted suggested to me that deadlines could function more as deterrence as opposed to absolute cutoffs, which could potentially discourage claimants who assume that they have no further options after they’ve gotten this decision.

And if there is this flexibility in regards to extenuating circumstances, why isn’t this more explicitly communicated? Why is this something that claimants actually have to fight for and in this case fighting for with the support of the legal professionals? It’d be even worse if the claimant was trying to do it by themselves. It almost seemed that the system is designed in a way that if there are fewer, challenges and it becomes like a more manageable caseload. But that’s not how justice is supposed to work, is it?

Jen Ang

As I listened to you talk about your experience at the UCL clinic, I mean, what you’ve described feels very, very familiar. in terms of my own observations from frontline advice, work and legal casework, all of those frustrations around potential clients not being able to find anyone to help them. So just a total lack of access to advice. But then also raising that question about whether access to justice, of the law working unequally for people is not just kind of an accident or not just because of quote, like barriers, like capacity barriers, but whether there’s actually something baked into the way that some of the process works.

Amanda Amaeshi

I mean there have definitely been good things as well. It’s been really, throughout my year of volunteering nurse, it was also really great to just see how many people the clinic were able to help in terms of getting a case outcome that was desirable or even just the clients feeling more confident and empowered to advocate for their rights and for the rights of their community. 

I remember actually getting a phone call from a client, her case had actually been resolved and she was actually saying, oh, someone else from her community had a similar issue. And she knew because her lawyer that she had at iLAC had really empowered her, really given the confidence, not just the practical advice of what to do, but also just making her feel heard and respected, that she knew, I have to send my friend here as well, because they were able to help me, maybe they can help her as well, my friend as well. So there’s definitely positive sides to it as well.

Jen Ang

That leads nicely on to my next question, which is, in light of what you’ve seen and learned, what do you think is the role of lawyers and the legal system in supporting social justice movements? Just bearing in mind that when we talk about the law and the legal system, both the actors within the system and also our opponents in the system are all lawyers. So it’s a broader question, for you, what do you think is their role?

Amanda Amaeshi

This question really, drew my mind back to some conversations I’ve been having during the seminars that I’ve had as part of the Access to Justice module. This idea of, what are lawyers supposed to do? Are they supposed to simply just advocate for their client in regards to how the law currently is, or is there kind of like a broader role as well of like, advocating for social justice? And I think it was called cause lawyering. And so that’s what this question really got me to think about. 

And I remember coming across a quote when I was reading, from an academic called James Douglas. And he said that a lawyer’s role in society is not to change the rules of the game, but to assist in maintaining the rules and to help resolve conflicts established under the rules. And I guess to an extent I can kind of, I can understand the logic behind the view. Like, it reflects a very traditional procedural understanding of the legal profession. And basically lawyers keep the system stable and functional by working within the rules that currently exist and in theory it makes the law predictable and fair and perhaps would increase public trust. Especially since lawyers are supposed to be seen as neutral figures to represent their clients, not to advance their personal ideologies. So it would ensure that everyone, no matter their background, can expect an objective and fair representation. And there’s also the constitutional argument that you don’t want lawyers or the judiciary to step over too much into what could be considered the role of legislators, like creating policy. 

But… so I think about these points and I get it, makes sense. I mean, it’s what I’ve been taught to think, from a very traditional law degree. But at the same time I also feel like it paints a fairly narrow picture of what the legal profession can be, because it assumes that the legal system is fixed and unchanging. But in reality it always evolves and sometimes I think it has to be challenged head-on when it fails to deliver justice. And I think lawyers are very uniquely placed, particularly those who are on the frontline of issues like housing or immigration, welfare or criminal justice. So in regards to housing and welfare, again I’m thinking back to the lawyers at the legal clinic. These lawyers in particular are often able to see the real-world effects of legal gaps and injustices and so then to suggest that their role is only to uphold the system no matter how flawed, it ignores the deep ethical questions that arise when the rules themselves are actually part of the access to justice problem. And laws, a lot of the time they aren’t just imperfect, they’re inherently outdated or harmful. Especially if they’re designed by decision makers that don’t have lived experience or don’t actively attempt to engage meaningfully with those with lived experience. So upholding these laws blindly, laws that are really outdated and harmful… in my view. It conflicts with the profession’s broader commitment to justice. Because if lawyers can’t or don’t challenge these unjust laws or practices, then, especially with their knowledge and their unique positioning, then who else will? And I think it is possible sometimes that lawyers can do both, still advocate for your client, but then also kind of pushing the boundaries when justice demands of it. 

So there’s another quote, from Jennifer Gordon, in her article ‘The Lawyer Is Not The Protagonist’. And then she outlines what she calls the conventional narrative, where a social problem arises, a lawyer steps in to fix it, the lawyer identifies the legal strategy, and either the case is won or lost. But I really liked how she challenged that whole framing and she offers an alternative view where the community group instead is the protagonist and the lawyer is instead part of the supporting cast. So the lawyer is not supposed to take over and be like, oh, ah, I’m the one that knows all the legal information, I’m the one that knows the fancy words, all the arguments. It’s not about that. So the question that the lawyer should be asking is not “how do I fix this?” But “what can legal tools do to support the broader strategy of the community?” And I thought it was really great rethinking because law can be used as a really good tool, but it’s not just law in isolation that could solve the big societal problems. Legal work has to be in service of a much bigger vision which is in line of collaborative community action, community-oriented actions as well… like getting rid of the top down solution, which is quite patronising I think and kind of like having the humility to lean in more to these grassroots movements and using law and using that legal expertise as one of many tools in a toolbox to help that process.

Jen Ang

That’s.. I’m sort of, I’m sort of in awe because that was first a very powerful critique of your view around the obligation of lawyers to think critically about whether to participate in injustice. And then a description of what movement lawyering or community lawyering could look like. That was really quite inspiring actually. It’s also a hopeful message for me to hear you describe that and to hear that vision as something that you think is possible or it’s possible for us to get better at moving towards. 

My last big question is a big question, and it’s this: in light of everything you’ve described about inequalities in the law itself, inequalities in access to the law and the role of lawyers, what for you does justice look like for you or your community?

Amanda Amaeshi

It’s a very big question. But I think it’s something that’s really important to think about because when it comes to dealing with problems it’s very easy to focus on the negatives and be like: oh we don’t like this, we don’t like this. But if you don’t have a clear idea of how do we want things to be instead then can be easy for the action that is happening to… fizzle out a little bit, without that kind of sustained hope of this is what we’re fighting for. 

But for me I’d say that justice looks like a legal system, a political system that is designed by, with and for the people that it aims to serve, especially those who are currently most vulnerable, most marginalised and furthest away from this power. And it’s not just about abstract legal principles which are in legislations or in courtroom decisions. But it’s really about whether the people at the sharpest edges of injustices feel seen, heard and protected. Like the example of like the clients from earlier where they felt heard and empowered in regards to their case. 

And it’s really important that justice has to be intersectional, it has to be collective, it has to be rooted in empathy. And it’s really important that these don’t just become buzzwords. They’re really essential core principles. And there has to be a commitment to listening to communities rather than just prescribing solutions based solely on labels that might be put on them by society. And I think especially the idea of empathy and humanity are really central to this vision. I think throughout my law degree, sometimes it’s kind of the case you have to focus on these, very quote unquote “intellectually serious” ideas, like rationality. But I think throughout the three years, especially in the modules that I’ve taken in final year, it’s really helped me understand this idea of empathy is transformative and it is as intellectually serious as any other idea. And, it’s a rigorous, necessary foundation for legal thinking and legal practice as well. 

And another thing, part of justice is that, something I see right now is that too often legal systems are shaped by fear. And I’m thinking about around the world, the rollback of rights under pressure from far-right movements and how as a result in Scotland and in the UK perhaps laws or policies are becoming a bit weaker in response to that. Issues of equality and justice can easily be sidelined in terms of self-interested party politics. But justice has to be braver than that. It has to put people and their dignity at the centre of the conversation. It can’t just be moved aside because it’s become politically inconvenient. It should always be at the core of what anybody’s doing. 

And as I’ve already alluded to, I don’t think that law alone can carry this burden of striving for justice. It’s definitely an important part. But, I think justice requires more than just legal reform. It needs moral imagination and sustained inclusive activism. And so law is a tool that must be wielded alongside storytelling, organising, mutual aid, education, care, all these other aspects. A lot of it comes from the community and I think that’s how real change and real justice happens.

Jen Ang

Amazing. I was almost again holding my breath, not wanting to interrupt you. But justice has to be, intersectional, collective, rooted in empathy. It has to come from the community. 

So my final, final question is, this: so the Lawmanity podcast will go out to all sorts of listeners and there will be some people out there who will be listening to your thoughts and what you’ve accomplished already as an activist and a law student, and will be wondering how you got here or maybe how to be you. 

So, my question is, what is your advice maybe for your younger self? And I know you’re still probably identifying as young! but you’re still a mentor to some, and if not your younger self, then to other people out there who are curious and who want to do some of the things you’ve been doing.

Amanda Amaeshi

This is a really lovely question and actually I remember last year I wrote an article all about this actually for The WOW Foundation, giving my advice to aspiring changemakers… and then the key points related to identifying one’s key interests and goals, finding the opportunities, building community, dealing with imposter syndrome – especially when you’re doing quite big roles like being on the National Advisory Council – and then also resisting that fear and apathy. So I would definitely encourage interested listeners to check that out. Perhaps that could be linked in the show notes. 

But I wanted to mention one other thing that I feel like I’ve not spoken about elsewhere before. Something new. Sometimes… especially when I’m thinking about younger me, maybe what 14, 15-year-old me would have wanted to hear when I first started doing this activism, advocacy stuff properly is that sometimes not everybody is going to understand why you care so much or why you want to do the actions that you’re doing. I mean, to be fair, a decent amount of people will, this is not to be off putting. I guess the reality is that some people might try to mock you, make fun of you, try to belittle you in the hopes that you might stop doing whatever it is that you’re doing and it can be quite disheartening to be honest. But I think it’s important to remember that advocating for change is never easy. And kind of like facing such remarks from other people is just one part of how it might not always be easy. But it’s really important to try not to let that get to you and just stay true to the value system that’s guiding you. Keep in your mind the changes that you wish to see, which again why I said that, think about the problems, we also have to think about the solutions as well, the ideal scenario, and keep in focus the changes that you wish to see which are possible. Don’t let anybody tell you otherwise and find yourself a community of changemakers who you can learn from, who you can seek support and solidarity from, and put in your best ability, and… don’t let other people’s small minds limit your imagination.

Jen Ang

Ah, that’s brilliant. Wise advice from a wise woman! 

Thank you for that and thank you for taking the time to sit down with me today, and to share with me your thoughts, which we’ll now get to share with a wider audience than just you and me. I could honestly sit and talk to you, Amanda, for, you know, another hour and have lots of questions about everything, but in the interest of letting you get on with your day, I’m going to draw the interview to a close here. But it’s been lovely to see you and I, and probably all of our listeners, will keep an eye out for what you do next because doubtless it will be just as bold and inspiring and interesting as today. 

And that’s a wrap for today’s episode with Amanda Amaeshi, activist, law graduate and my new colleague here at Lawmanity. If you were inspired by what Amanda has shared and want to learn more about the Legal Aid crisis that’s preventing survivors of domestic violence from accessing the legal advice they need, or if you want to explore what it means to be a community lawyer or a cause lawyer, check out the links in our episode notes. And for those of you who are practically minded, reach out to your local Women’s Aid and Rape Crisis organisation or your local Citizens Advice Bureau, educate yourself and others, and maybe consider volunteering. 

We’ll be back again soon with our next episode, an amazing one to one with Davie Donaldson, a young activist from the Scottish traveller community, who shares his perspective on the challenges of preserving and protecting travelling culture under laws that are written and enforced primarily by and for settled people. Davie vividly illustrates what it looks like day-to-day in his advocacy on behalf of his family and his community. 

Thanks for tuning in to our Lawmanity podcast again and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please do hit the like and subscribe buttons and share our episodes with friends and colleagues who might enjoy learning a little bit more about how law really works in practice and how it can be used to make the world a better, brighter place. 

The Lawmanity podcast is co-produced by me, your host Jen Ang, and by the brilliant and talented Natalia Uribe. Shout out to Helena Refai for mentoring us through our first year of this incredible project. And welcome to Amanda Amaeshi, who’s joined the team to support us with graphics and socials. The music you’ve been listening to is Always On The Move by Musicians in Exile, a Glasgow-based music project led by people seeking refuge in Scotland. Thanks so much for tuning in today. We hope you enjoyed listening and see you next time!

Host: Jen Ang

Davie Donaldson

“So what I would tell a younger version of myself is what you’re seeing around you right now doesn’t have to be that way.”

Satwat Rehman

“Just be true to yourself in what you’re doing, you know, don’t be shaken from that. And be happy in what you do. Yeah, because we don’t struggle for the sake of struggle. We struggle for the sake of everybody having a better life, you know, and so that can’t just be about work and activism. We have to remember what it is we’re fighting for.”

Background music lyrics

“We’re musicians in exile and this is the song of hope saying…”

Jen Ang

Hey, everyone, welcome back – after a bit of a wee break, let’s call this a winter hibernation – to the Lawmanity podcast. 

This week we’re marking the start of the new Lunar Year, the Year of the Fire Horse, as well as the start of Ramadan and of the Lenten season for those of you who celebrate it. For all of these great world traditions, the start of these periods mark a time for reflection, for reconnection and for renewal. We draw close to the people who are important to us. We evaluate the year gone past. We tell our stories, share our wisdoms, recommit to our values and prepare ourselves for the year coming. 
I love these traditions. And in this cycle of human history, these dates also fall near the start of spring in the northern hemisphere: when the cold eases, the days start to lengthen, and we’re greeted by the earliest flowers – in my garden, snowdrops, crocuses and daffodils. 

This year’s resolution for me and with the Lawmanity Project is to sow radical seeds – meaning to dedicate the year to supporting small actions that could lead to radically different futures for someone, somewhere, someday, every single day. And today, my offering to you listeners, with unending gratitude to the activists and friends who helped me to put this together, is an episode titled “Advice to My Younger Self”. 

In today’s episode, we get to hear from a wide range of people who have dedicated their lives to challenging inequality and pursuing justice for others. And I asked them each this simple question: what advice would you give your younger self? Someone just like you, or perhaps someone who wants to be you. I found inspiration, laughter and a great deal of wisdom in their responses, and this is my very favourite episode to date. I hope you enjoy this as much as we have in putting together the show for you. 

Let’s kick off with Davie Donaldson. Davie is a leading Travellers’ rights activist based in Scotland and started his career early at the age of 15, speaking out about the injustices faced by himself and his community – navigating a social, economic and legal landscape that was built for settled people and not in the interests of travelling people.

Davie Donaldson

An activist who I look up to in the civil rights movement is Harry Belafonte, right? And he’s famously quoted as saying, “I became an activist because I grew up in poverty,” right? And I think for me, that is a situation… I never chose to be an activist or a campaign or an advocate or whatever title I place on whatever it is that I do, right? But I grew up as a gypsy traveller in Scotland, and I think, by that experience, I recognised that something needed to change so that the next generation didn’t grow up in the way that I did, right? 

So I think for anyone out there who is thinking about becoming a human rights defender or, you know, whether that be at the grassroots level as a community campaigner, as an advocate, as a human rights lawyer even, and, you know, moving into the legal profession, I think do it, right? If you’ve got that calling in you, then there’s something in your lived experience which recognises injustice as injustice, right? And that’s, that’s the basic point of it. You know, you don’t need a particular degree – or you will if you want to be a lawyer, right? But in order to actually campaign on these things, I think it’s important to just have that base level of, here’s where I’m starting from, here’s what injustice looks like and here’s how it needs to change. And that basic human relationship with justice is something which we can all tap into, whether or not we’re legally trained. 

So what I would tell a younger version of myself is: what you’re seeing around you right now doesn’t have to be that way, right? It doesn’t have to be that way. You don’t need to experience the evictions that you’ve experienced. You don’t need to experience the hate, the discrimination, the… the barriers to your culture, to accessing the voices of your ancestors. You don’t need to experience that. And you have the tools, everyone does, in order to move forward and to change that for the next generation and for yourself. You know, let’s… let’s move into a place where we’re not just thinking about fifty, sixty, you know, hundred years, potentially down the line, you know, and the descendants to come. 

Oftentimes indigenous communities, we fall into that perspective of, yeah, we’re doing this for the future. And it’s this quite indistinguishable, ungraspable future, right? Let’s do it for ourselves. You know, why can’t things change now? Why can’t we lead dialogue and conversation which can impact our communities and our families now? And why do we have to face these indignities and sacrifice our own sense of belonging, our own sense of justice, in order for the future? We shouldn’t have to sacrifice that. Let’s claim justice today and make sure that we ourselves can also experience what we believe justice should look like.

Jen Ang

So inspiring and so right. But what advice do our activists have for those of us who know that challenging injustice is important to us, but don’t know how to get started? 
Sandy Brindley, chief executive of Scottish Rape Crisis, reminds us how frontline community activism, including volunteering, can make such a difference, not just to the communities we serve, but also to ourselves.

Sandy Brindley

I think in many ways I’ve been really fortunate about finding a passion. Like not, not many people have a job that they believe in so deeply where you feel like you are able to progress change as part of your job. So I think it is about finding your passion and what you believe in and trying to find a role that’s consistent with your values and with your passion. 

In terms of becoming involved in Rape Crisis, like one of the best ways of becoming involved – and this is not accessible to everybody but – is volunteering, that’s how I started. I started as a volunteer in the helpline. That has been so invaluable to me, that experience, I did that for a number of years. Just that is where you learn, is you learn from speaking directly to survivors. I believe really strongly that’s how legal strategy and policy has to work, is if it’s directly informed by survivors voices. So if this is the work you want to do, your starting point for me is supporting and listening to survivors. And then, I think that then gives you the answers to what needs to happen, which then I think informs your trajectory of how you want to change the world, really.

Jen Ang

Great. But what if you don’t know where exactly your passion lies? Here’s some advice from Talat Yaqoob. Talat is a Scottish political commentator, feminist campaigner and co-Chair of the First Minister’s National Advisory Council for Women and Girls. Her top tip? Stay open to unlikely opportunities.

Talat Yaqoob

Okay, so the somewhat facetious response is sunscreen and moisturiser – and I do wish I had gone back and said that to myself. 

I think, what’s really interesting is that this is not a… I didn’t know this was a career. At no point did I think this was a career. If I was to follow what it was that I thought I’d be doing at the age of 18, I should be a clinical psychologist right now. And so I guess the advice would be if an opportunity presents itself and it lights something, even if it’s not on the plan, do it. Because I very, very easily, and very closely didn’t do it because I was like, well, I’ve got a five-year plan and I meant to go and do a master’s and then I meant to go and become a clinical psychologist and I meant to do my doctorate and… and I, I almost didn’t do it, but then, you know, at university I realised that actually, hold on, my politics has been given an outlet and there are these really great people that I’m able to have conversations with and we’re debating and nobody’s telling me shush, like, like they do at the dinner table at home. Like it’s not. And, and had I not taken that opportunity, that feels kind of exciting but isn’t in the plan, isn’t the status quo, nobody before me has done it… I wouldn’t get to do what I do now. And as hard as it is and sometimes as upsetting as it is, I wouldn’t want to be anybody else, I wouldn’t want to be doing anything else. 

So even if it’s not on the plan, it’s not in the five-year plan or the ten-year plan – and if you’re, you’re like me, you probably have one – if it feels good and it feels exciting, give it a try. Especially if it maybe is a little bit uncomfortable. I would advocate for that because 100% I would not be doing anything that I did if I didn’t go to become, ah, my student union and suddenly get involved and find really awesome people and then suddenly get involved in other campaigns and yeah, give it a try. Even if it’s temporary, it’s something worth learning.

Jen Ang

And once you’ve taken that unlikely opportunity, gotten yourself a seat at the table, then what? 

Let’s hear from one of my very favourite people in the world, Andy Sirel: partner and legal director at the charity Just Right Scotland, and my colleague for many years. 
Andy is a legal expert on human rights, children’s rights and migrants’ rights and has led groundbreaking litigation and campaigns in all these areas. 

I first met Andy when he was himself a young activist and lawyer, and his advice here rings true to how he has grown and shaped a very successful career in law and human rights.

Andy Sirel

You need to be positive. You need to look for opportunities where other people see negatives. And I think that is something that not everyone’s able to do, but we can if we try. 

And, if I’m honest with you, you need to treat everybody, regardless of who they are, regardless of status or position or seniority or age or anything, you need to treat everybody the same with dignity, courtesy, interest. And not only by doing that do you learn a lot, you obtain people’s trust and you’re honest and then doors open and opportunities present themselves. But only by doing that do you get their trust. And that is actually, you know, things go from there. So those are the sort of very simple pieces of advice I would give.

Jen Ang

And what if you’re in the room, have something to say and you start feeling the fear?
Let’s hear next from Lily Greenan. Lily’s career in Scotland has encompassed feminist activism in the violence against women and girls movements. And from 2006 to 2015 she was the chief executive of Scottish Women’s Aid. 

In her early career, along with other lesbian and gay rights activists, she also led opposition to Margaret Thatcher’s anti-gay Section 28 law. Towards the end of this quote, she mentions Lark in the Park, which was the first major public gay rights event in Scotland, taking place on 28th May 1988 in Edinburgh. 

Here’s Lily on her advice to young activists.

Lily Greenan

I think advice from my younger self would be be less afraid. Yeah, I was anxious 20-year-old, for lots of reasons. And since then… I didn’t grow up in a religious household, but I heard someone who was Quaker talking about the feeling of being moved to speak in worship, in a meeting for worship, which is a silent meeting unless someone feels moved to speak. And someone who I knew well described it. And I thought: oh, I, I know that feeling. And it’s that I was anxious and worried about doing the wrong thing in whatever context, socially and academically and like whatever, I worried about doing things wrong. And I would still be a bit plagued by that after I got involved with Rape Crisis, and other sort of bits of activism. So what would happen is that I would be really wound up, really anxious and then I would just have to speak. And my back used to spasm. It was that extreme. Like I would stand up and speak and when I sat down my back would be in spasm because I was so wound up. 

And I think I would love it if younger people coming into this kind of work, could learn ways to be more relaxed about it, because it really wasn’t that big a deal, most of the time. I think it held me back from doing maybe more than I did and, you know, and I got past it, but it took a while. 

And the other is write stuff down. I’m sitting in my attic office at home, looking at the archive boxes that I have to sort. I’ve been keeping… I wouldn’t call it a diary – I keep notes at meetings, I take notes at meetings. It’s partly because I’ve always had a bit of a shit memory, so I needed to be able to remind myself what. And what I have realised over the last few years is that I can go back and find the notes from that meeting in 2010 and, you know, something will happen. It allows me to connect the dots. If I need to, I can go back and check, you know, like, that’s there. I don’t know what I’m going to do with them because there’s quite a lot of notebooks. But they’re a useful personal archive and a resource about how the different areas of the work connect up. Because they’re not just about, they’re not just notes I took in meetings I was being paid to attend. I’ve been doing it, you know, sort of since the early 80s. And, yeah, or find, find some way to, to document what you’re doing and to be able to go back now and again and remind yourself that you’ve learned a few things since then. And that you maybe wouldn’t approach the problem in quite that way now. But also there’s some good ideas in there that you forget because you move on and you do other things. So there’s something that I would encourage people to document and not just for ourselves. 
There are areas of our activist histories that are just not visible. The Scottish Homosexual Action Group, I went looking for some information about Lark in the Park and it’s attributed to the other more established group, as the group that organised it on Wikipedia, because the Scottish Homosexual Action Group wasn’t that organised with documenting. So I’m going to learn how to edit Wikipedia, so I can fix that because… you know, it’s a small thing, but I was like, they didn’t do it, we did that, you know. And I, thought, yeah, okay, it’s, it’s worth taking some notes and, for… well, for future generations as well, you know, there are libraries. 

I hope that we will always have libraries of some sort, and we need to be able to learn what worked and what didn’t work. So even if it’s not stuff that’s going to be published, being able to share it somehow, finding a way to share what you’ve done that worked that was successful, and what you did that just landed flat and left everyone feeling a bit yuck because activism, you mentioned joy earlier and yeah, the picnic in the park was all about… like we’re going to have a party, they’re telling us we’re not real, we’re going to have a party. And finding ways to hold on to those bits of joy and successes is worth it. Other people need to know.

Jen Ang

Something that all our activists recognise is that caring about the world and trying to change it is hard. And the more visible you are, the more you personally and voluntarily shoulder the burden of sticking out, saying different, being perceived as different, and sometimes suffering for it. How to cope with that? 

Here’s some wise words from Amanda Amaeshi. Amanda is an award-winning activist, campaigner and writer who focuses on gender inequality, anti-racism and youth voice and political participation. She’s been an activist since her teens with the Girlguiding movement and has recently graduated from the UCL with a degree in law.

Amanda Amaeshi

This is a really lovely question and actually I remember last year I wrote an article all about this actually for The WOW Foundation, giving my advice to aspiring changemakers… and then the key points related to identifying one’s key interests and goals, finding the opportunities, building community, dealing with imposter syndrome – especially when you’re doing quite big roles like being on the National Advisory Council – and then also resisting that fear and apathy. So I would definitely encourage interested listeners to check that out. Perhaps that could be linked in the show notes. 

But I wanted to mention one other thing that I feel like I’ve not spoken about elsewhere before. Something new. Sometimes… especially when I’m thinking about younger me, maybe what 14, 15-year-old me would have wanted to hear when I first started doing this activism, advocacy stuff properly is that sometimes not everybody is going to understand why you care so much or why you want to do the actions that you’re doing. I mean, to be fair, a decent amount of people will, this is not to be off putting. I guess the reality is that some people might try to mock you, make fun of you, try to belittle you in the hopes that you might stop doing whatever it is that you’re doing and it can be quite disheartening to be honest. But I think it’s important to remember that advocating for change is never easy. And kind of like facing such remarks from other people is just one part of how it might not always be easy.

But it’s really important to try not to let that get to you and just stay true to the value system that’s guiding you. Keep in your mind the changes that you wish to see, which again why I said that, think about the problems, we also have to think about the solutions as well, the ideal scenario, and keep in focus the changes that you wish to see which are possible. Don’t let anybody tell you otherwise and find yourself a community of changemakers who you can learn from, who you can seek support and solidarity from, and put in your best ability, and… don’t let other people’s small minds limit your imagination.

Jen Ang

Don’t let other people’s small minds limit your imagination. Love that so much. 
Need a little more advice to bolster yourself against those doubts that creep in, those tiny criticisms from others that amplify in your mind and the self-doubt that so many of us never really shake? Let’s hear next from Pheona Matovu. 

Pheona is a social entrepreneur and co-founder of Radiant and Brighter, an anti-racist educator and advocate. She is completing a PhD at the University of Glasgow on how workplaces can take actions against racism and has also recently published a book, the Radiant and Brighter Antiracism Journal. Pheona talks to us about turning 50 and the realisation that the biggest and most important job is that you can have is learning to be you and then to be more you.

Pheona Matovu

One of the things that happens when you take a challenging journey or when you get to the age I am, which is, for those who will be listening, I made 50 this year. So can I just say, when I talk about making 50, I speak about it with, with appreciation. I know that people usually are cautious about their age. But just before I made 50, a few people I knew personally, left and they’re no longer with us and I became more appreciative and I started to think I’m glad that I am here at 50. So that’s why I have made a big deal of it than probably anybody else I know!

But when you get to the age I am, you realise all that all the while it was okay to just be you, just be you. And also, and I completely and totally believe, it’s important to have integrity and to be authentic. Now some of the things that we, that I’ve had to be part of, they’re great things, they’re amazing things… there is a stage at which you need to know who you are and make decisions based on what you believe in. If you don’t focus on understanding and knowing yourself and the values, or you don’t get the opportunity to, because of circumstances or situations or the environments we find ourselves in, which is which… it’s difficult to know who you were when everything is screaming at you and trying to make you somebody else and to be who you were when you have to… you know, try and work within an environment that does not perhaps accept you or… but I think it’s okay to remove yourself from situations, people, environments that seek to fix you when you, when you are okay. 

So I would say be you. If you don’t know who you are, take time to know who you were. Allow yourself to just know yourself and be you. And at this age, it’s something that I am learning still, but it’s a very powerful tool because you don’t have to try and be somebody else. You don’t have to try and fight things a certain way. Some people fight a certain way, others fight in different ways, others don’t fight at all. Others do not have the tools and what they need to fight. And it’s okay. It’s just okay. Just okay.

Jen Ang

Oh, are we feeling emotional yet? 

As I mentioned earlier, putting together this episode has been such a treat. A little bit like writing a collective love letter to ourselves as young activists, and also to those people out there, young or old, who are just starting out on your activism journeys.
So when the going gets tough and you need a little encouragement, where do our activists turn for help? To each other, of course. 

Here, Heather Fisken, chief executive of Inclusion Scotland, reminds me of why we loved working together so much and why we worked so hard to do that for many years, even without formal funding or support. 

Inclusion Scotland is Scotland’s umbrella organisation for Disabled Peoples, or DPOs, which is something that Heather mentions when she gives this advice.

Heather Fisken

Just keep doing it, keep doing it. If you are in the right, then be in the right, own it, own your space and collectivise with other people. The strength in collectivising, not just within your own community, but with allied communities. And Jen, you and I go back some way, and I’ve always wanted to do more work in our organisation around justice, but like many DPOs, we don’t have the funding. I think that the digital world has really opened up activism, in a low-cost kind of way, but just keep going for it and collectivise. Use your allies, give to your allies as well. You never know when you’re going to need them. And just keep going. If you’re in the right, then you’re on the right path, basically.

Jen Ang

And following on from Heather, Tressa Burke, Chief Executive of the Glasgow Disability alliance, agrees wholeheartedly.

Tressa Burke

Oh, my goodness, that’s a hard question. Run a mile! Don’t do it. 

No, I think, know that you can’t do everything. Do what you can and don’t do it alone. Build allies, build friends, build support. I think, really, I feel, I feel as though I’m a builder, you can see that because GDA has almost 6,000 members now. And it’s not just me, it’s never been just me, it’s always been a collective cause. And I think that holding onto that peer support is so important. It’s important to our members, but it’s also important to chief execs supporting each other. To me, with my team supporting each other, you know, we don’t get dissuaded from the cause and from the mission, and we support each other doing it. 

But the other, I suppose, piece of advice would be, to myself. Don’t get too upset when you know you’re going to get knocked down, but just get back up. Just keep getting back up. But you need support to do that and that’s why the support is so important, because you can keep going if you’ve got the support, but if you’re doing it all alone or if you feel that you’re taking it all on your own, that’s too much. So definitely, I think support is the big part of it and keeping getting back up. Because the thing is, you absolutely will get knocked down. You’ll be slapped down some of the times, you’ll be knocked down some of the times. I’ve had it all. But, yeah, keep going, it’s worth it, it’s worth it because you’re helping people change their lives and have a better life.

Jen Ang

We’ve stepped now into advice around resilience, and this seems like the perfect time to bring in Satwat Rehman. Satwat is a feminist, anti-racism activist and Chief Executive of One Parent Family Scotland, the leading charity working with single parent families in Scotland.

Satwat Rehman

Don’t doubt yourself all the time. Yeah, that would be my first thing. And, you know, shake off that imposter syndrome. You’ve got a right to be there and as much of a right as anybody else, you know. We’ve all taken different paths to get to where we are. And I didn’t set off on my sort of work journey thinking this is where I want to end up. But I’ve always… and I think, yeah, I suppose this for me would be the most important advice: just be true to yourself in what you’re doing, you know. Don’t be shaken from that. And be happy in what you do. Yeah, because we don’t struggle for the sake of struggle; we struggle for the sake of everybody having a better life, you know, and so that can’t just be about work and activism. We have to remember what it is we’re fighting for. 

Can I just say one thing? There’s not a meeting I don’t go into without suffering from imposter syndrome still. Well, I was… weekend before last, I went down to London to go to see Massive Attack in concert. And at the start of that, the wonderful actor, Khalid Abdullah, who’s been speaking out on Palestine since the word go, gave a five-minute speech which was absolutely amazing. And one of the things he said towards the end was: I know it’s hard for you to think about enjoying yourselves and relaxing and dancing because so many of you have been so active on Palestine and continue to be so active on Palestine, but it’s important that you do so. It’s important that you remember why we struggle and why we campaign.

Jen Ang

I love how Satwat talks about finding resilience and joy in community and celebration, which feels like a fitting way to bring us back to where we started, marking the new Lunar Year, the start of Ramadan and the start of the Lenten season. 

So to conclude, I leave you with some final words from Alison Pickup, award-winning barrister and Executive Director of the Helen Bamber Foundation Group, who work for the rehabilitation of survivors of trafficking and torture.

Alison Pickup

I think my number one piece of advice is don’t hurry. Like, I think when you’re young and enthusiastic, you can be very impatient to get on with your career and with achieving big things. But, there’s plenty of time and what’s important is to really take time to know what you enjoy, what motivates you, where your skills are and focus on that area. 

So for me it was a very gradual path. You know, I started as a caseworker. I realised that I really enjoyed being an advocate in court and so I ended up qualifying as a barrister. And then, you know, after having practised for kind of nearly 10 years, I then decided I wanted to move more into the NGO world. 

And so, like, I just think, don’t hurry and take your time and learn and learn what’s good. And the other one I would say is, colleagues, partnership network, is really important. You, this work can be really challenging emotionally as well as stressful. It can be very tiring. You can’t do it alone and you need to build that network in, you know, in your workplace, with colleagues in the sector, with people who don’t work in this world at all in order to have, like, really good support around you and people who understand what drives you, who are there for you when things get tough is really important.

Jen Ang

Wow. I hope you’ve loved this episode as much as I have and that we have brought some warmth, solace or inspiration into your day and maybe even sown some radical seeds with you. 

And so concludes today’s episode in which a number of activists and friends have shared with us their advice to their younger selves and for you, all of you. 

Meanwhile, a very big thank you to Davie Donaldson, Sandy Brindley, Talat Yaqoob, Andy Sirel, Lily Greenan, Amanda Amaeshi, Pheona Matovu, Heather Fisken, Tressa Burke, Satwat Rehman, and Alison Pickup for their contributions to today’s episode.
And thanks so much to you, the listeners, for tuning into our Lawmanity podcast again in the new year and for this, the last of our special series on Equality Under the Law in Scotland. 

If you loved this podcast, please do hit the subscribe buttons and also like and share our episodes with friends and colleagues who might enjoy learning a little bit about how law really works in practice and how it can be used to make the world a better, brighter place. 

Our ‘Equality Under the Law’ series has been generously supported by a grant from the Atlantic Fellows for Social and Economic Equity, hosted by the London School of Economics. The Lawmanity podcast is co-produced by me, your host Jen Ang, and by the brilliant and talented Natalia Uribe. And the music you’ve been listening to is “Always on the Move” by Musicians in Exile, a Glasgow-based music project led by people seeking refuge in Scotland. 

Thanks so much for tuning in today, we hope you enjoyed listening, and see you next time!

Host: Jen Ang

Davie Donaldson

“..but at the very baseline of all of this is the fact that everybody in Scotland should be allowed to live respectfully and in a dignified way, right? 

And for gypsy travellers, that means we want to experience our culture, our indigenous culture that’s been passed down by our ancestors for generation after generation. We want to ensure that our children and the next generation get to hear the stories and songs which link us to the landscape.”

Jen Ang

Hello and welcome to a special series of three podcasts – part of our Equal Under the Law? Series – which explores three big questions about the complex relationship between the law and social justice, through interviews with some of Scotland’s most inspiring and impactful activists campaigning today.

Over the past few months, we have interviewed 11 guests for the Lawmanity podcast, who work across a range of social justice issues, including: LGBT+ rights, racial justice, migrants rights, Scottish travellers rights, disability justice, and the rights of women and girl survivors.  

We asked each of our guests three big questions, because we wanted to understand what their personal experiences – whether drawn from just a few years’ of campaigning, or sometimes, over as many as four decades of activism – told them about the relationship between law and justice.

Jen Ang

 Today, we’re going to look the answers we got to our final question – and it’s a big one! 

What does justice look like for you, or for your community? 

Heather Fisken, Chief Executive Officer of Inclusion Scotland, a disabled peoples’ organisation (DPO) – opened by pointing out how we will know that we have truly achieved justice:  

Heather Fisken

Well, I suppose that goes to justice, achieve justice in practice. When it’s happening, we wouldn’t have a need for justice because would be no injustice. 

Sorry, I’m not lawyer, so that’s the kind of thing I would say.

Jen Ang

And Heather goes onto describe justice for disabled people:

Heather Fisken 

So justice would look like ready availability of support, and a willingness to see the law as a route that is accessible, attainable, appropriate, when it is – and something that’s for you, it’s for everybody.

Jen Ang

Tressa Burke, Chief Executive Officer of Glasgow Disability Alliance, expands this into a compelling vision of what justice looks like for disabled people across Scotland, for her and her colleagues 

Tressa Burke

So, I’ll take it from a broader perspective first. So social justice for disabled people, and if they were having all their legal rights realised and fulfilled, would be about having access to a meaningful life and a life of purpose and a life of choices.

It would be about participation. It would be about being included in their communities and their families in wider society. It would be about having a job, a job that pays well, a job where the employer knows what access to work is, the scheme itself, the programme of support, but also what access in the workplace means.

It would be about disabled people not living in abject and deep and long-term poverty. It would be about disabled people you know accessing the health and social care services that they need. 

So you know in terms of social justice, it would be all of those things: fairness, freedom, having dignity, having choices, and the same choices as non-disabled people take for granted. 

So when we are talking about choices like that, Sometimes disabled people aren’t able to choose when they get up, what they wear, if they wear anything, when they have a shower, if they have a shower. We’re frequently told about disabled people being told that they’re only entitled to so many showers a week, or a month. I’ve got disabled people who lost their social care packages at the outset of lockdown when 1,884 packages were cut by Glasgow City Council and other local authorities around Scotland, but that’s the figure they themselves gave to the BBC in April 2020. And they haven’t all been reinstated, and many not reinstated at all, and all of them requiring new assessments and people being told: “You coped then, how can you not cope now?”

So, I mean, these are the types of, you know, breaches to human rights that we’re talking about. 

 I think for disabled people to have justice, both legally and in in that wider fairness and social justice way, not only would they have those things, but if they didn’t have them, there would be better complaint systems.

They would be transparent. They would be independent before you even got to the legal situation. And then, of course, you would be able to access the legal system. You would know the lawyers to go to because it wouldn’t just be one or two that might be good because they’re good people or, you know, somebody that’s married to a disabled person or because we do have examples of that. …

You know, and that’s how desperate things can be. So it would be much more readily available access and it would be affordable because people would be able to access it through legal aid.

But hopefully things would be better than needing to take it to the legal route because you would be able to have your complaints or your issues resolved at an earlier stage and that sense of fairness and freedom and would be observed and realised.

I think you know it’s not to be ignored how difficult things are for local authorities. But when people in Glasgow are now referring to feeling as brutalised by social work and social work assessments and how they are treated, not in every case by any means.

So it local authorities are struggling for sure. And local government funding is definitely an issue. But it is about choices. And disability is a political and a social and economic choice. And disabled people need to be prioritised. So I know that’s a long-winded answer, but these are the ways that disabled people’s lives would look if they were, you know, having their rights and their freedoms observed and realised, and we would have access to that redress, which at this point in time we just don’t have.

Jen Ang

As for how to get there, Pheona Matovu, Founding Director of Radiant & Brighter who also works with racialised and migrant families, believes it is crucial that the people who are impacted by policies are brought to the table, to help design our future legal system.

Pheona Matovu

That’s a big question, very big question. I couldn’t possibly say that I know. What I can say is that I know how that could be achieved.

And even then, maybe I think I know, but I think for it to look how we want it to look, it requires engagement for my community, for the communities that I work with, for the local communities I engage with, people who are affected by poverty, people are affected by migration, people are affected…

When you think, for example, about migration, right? People in these Western countries who can travel to every part of the world do not actually stop to think that they can travel to every part of the world, many times.

There is sometimes an assumption that the immigration law works for everybody the same way. But I know – as a black woman who had to come from Africa – I understand that the hoops that you have to jump through to even just go and pay an education, for an education even that, is significantly, .. it takes everything out of you. It takes everything out of your family. 

And they can choose to say, no, you are not coming. And guess what? Your money is lost. And that’s not just a little bit of money. That’s thousands of money usually. 

And so I think we need to redesign in a way that we are engaging everybody, in a way that is healthy and dignified for everybody. 

And I don’t think that that’s happening. So I think we need to consider bringing other people to the table, perhaps even those people being the core elements and the core designers of what we are looking at, particularly if it is going to affect them the most.

Jen Ang

And Satwat Rehman, Founding Director of One Parent Families Scotland, agrees – explaining what this looks like for single parent families:

Satwat Rehman

Okay, I want to start small, then build big. I think dignity, fairness and equity. 

Do you know if people can actually experience those things in the single parent community, not just in the law, but also the fact that what’s in law can drive how society behaves, you’d begin to see the beginnings of justice, alright? 

Because if you have that, if you have equity and justice as the cornerstones, then and you build up from there, you should be actively designing poverty out of your systems, alright?

You should be actively designing sort of things I’ve spoken about in education for families, it would be like the law would recognise that there is more than one type of family and they’re all equally valid. 

They’re all equally important, but actually they require different things, and that should be the cornerstone for me.

Over and above, that it would be great if we had accessible, responsive legal systems that protect our rights without making us jump through hoops. That would be great. 

Yes, a voice in actually shaping policies and understanding what the laws are behind those policies and how you can influence them as they’re being designed and not feel excluded from them because of the language and the process, would be really important. 

Jen Ang

Talat Yaqoob, political commentator, activist and co-Chair of the National Advisory Council for Women and Girls (NACWG) tackles this question from a different angle, the perspective of what making law just could look like.

Talat Yaqoob 

Wow. Okay, so what does law as injustice look like for the community I do? You know what I have to say that I think if, if we can use law as a way to redistribute power, that would be justice. 

That’s not, that’s not the way in which we think about law and write law. A lot of law is written as in a reactionary way. An issue has occurred, a law is required. This is what will be done in the future, and it is focused deeply on criminalisation. It’s focused on and I know that sounds like of course it is, but actually no the thinking around it about the realisation of rights and law as a tool to redistribute power, to create accountability. That is law that creates justice. That’s law that people can have more trust in, you know. 

So if we think about things like, we’re in Scotland, the acts that we pass, the law that we implement, actually, regardless of whether it’s Scotland, UK, any nation, actually, if we’re we write law that centres the redistribution of power that centres the ability for accountability to be closer to people. That’s transformative. That’s transformative justice, in my in my view, that is social justice being realised to the law. 

And for me, it’s about looking at the way in which law is written and the rationale with which new laws are created, the mindset behind that is what needs to change. 

And if that can be more about redistribution, that can be more about transformation and social justice, in which laws we choose to prioritise, and the mindset behind them. I think, I think that would, that could, that could change the face of society in a radically short time. 

And actually, it would make law and law making an accessible feature of society. But it’s about the mindset behind why law is created and what law is for, if we could do more about that, if we could do more to challenge that, that it doesn’t need to be this traditional, archaic view of what law is and why law exists, and that law is to pursue the criminalisation of society or the…or for a hierarchy to come and protect society rather than enabling the protection of itself. I think that would be transformative.

Jen Ang

Pinar Aksu, migrant rights activist, tells us that justice for the community she works with – migrants, including asylum seekers and refugees – looks like being treated equally, with humanity and dignity.

Pinar Aksu 

For me is, I guess, justice within the migration – especially when you look at how there are so many violent policies being implemented on people –  is for people to just live a normal life. 

I would say, for me, that would be justice for people to just be treated as a human being and to live a normal life where they don’t have to go through many hurdles to prove themselves of who they are, where they don’t have to continuously go to give evidence at the Home Office, or where they don’t have to continuously fight for their rights within society and live with long term difference that’s been created in communities. 

Yeah, I think just being treated as human being and to have a normal life, that, for me, would be justice and also to seen as equal. I think that’s the most important thing. 

Jen Ang

For Davie Donaldson, Travellers rights activist, justice for his community looks like achieving equality and dignitiy in practice, but also recognition of the rights and validity of the traveller culture and way of life.

Davie Donaldson

Yeah, and it’s a question that I ask myself every time I visit a camp or every time that I’m speaking to someone who’s just experienced hate crime or someone who is terrified of losing their kids to social services and just doesn’t know how to how to go about even challenging decisions, right?

And because of that, I think justice… is something which is experienced on a really individual level. Justice is something that really relies upon former experience. It relies upon an acknowledgement of past trauma, both collective and individual.

But it also recognises that everyone has a right to live in a dignified and respected way, right? And that’s where our justice system falls short, right?

Let’s pull it right back. I mean, I’m really keen to talk about legal arguments and legal frameworks, but at the very baseline of all of this is the fact that everybody in Scotland should be allowed to live respectfully and in a dignified way, right? 

And for gypsy travellers, that means we want to experience our culture, our indigenous culture that’s been passed down by our ancestors for generation after generation. We want to ensure that our children and the next generation get to hear the stories and songs which link us to the landscape.

It’s about knowing where you come from, learning your language, having the ability to come together as a community and experience your own sense of identity and your own sense belonging.

Currently, the justice system in Scotland is a barrier to all of that. Now, how justice would look, to paint a picture, I imagine, would be a gypsy traveller family would be able to travel unimpeded to their ancestral stopping places.

There would be significant and sustained support for gypsy travellers travelling and shifting, is our word for that, but shifting around the country. Basic support, access to basic sanitation, access to running water, access to refuse collection in bins, toilets.

You know, really basic human needs should be met in a just society. We should recognise and respect that there are very few nomadic communities left in the world, particularly in the Western world.

And so having a nomadic community in Scotland, like the gypsy travellers, is something that should be celebrated, it shouldn’t be impeded, right? I mean, living in a nomadic way, having a particular unique relationship to the landscape and the oral heritage of the land, is something that we should all want to celebrate, whether or not we’re gypsy travellers.

And to be able to travel and not worry about eviction, not have that constant stress, that constant feeling of surveillance every single time you move, knowing that local settled communities will respect your right to be there and will support you to be there in a safe and dignified manner.

You know, they won’t expect you to have to remove all of your rubbish and travel from place to place with these cartloads of rubbish because you can’t access a council recycling facility. Because if you burn the rubbish, you you’ll get charged because you aren’t provided any bins.

You know, they don’t expect you to have the toilet behind a hedge because they won’t provide you toilets or they’ll lock the public toilets you don’t get to access them, or they’ll refuse to allow you access to toilets in a local shop.

Dignity, you know, that’s what the justice system should look like. And I think if we move to a place where there are legal protections on the right for gypsy travellers to travel, it won’t only positively impact the gypsy traveller community, but it’ll positively impact the settled community as well, because it’ll allow that travelling to be done in a safer, and more community cohesive way.

Jen Ang

And to conclude this podcast today, here’s a reflection from Amanda Amaeshi, an activist with the Young Women’s Movement and a former law student at the University College, London (UCL), who speaks to what justice looks like from the perspective of someone aspiring to activism from within the legal system.

Amanda Amaeshi

Justice looks like a legal system, a political system that’s designed by women for like, the people that it aims to serve – especially those who are like most who are currently most vulnerable, most marginalised and furthest away from this power. 

And it’s not just about like abstract legal principles or which are in legislations or in courtroom decisions, but it’s really about whether the people at the sharpest edges of injustice feel seen, heard and protected, like the example of like the clients from earlier, where they felt heard and empowered in regards to like their case. 

And it’s really important that like justice has to be intersectional, has to be collective, it has to be rooted in empathy. And it’s really important that these don’t just become buzzwords like, they’re really like, essential core principles, and there has to be a commitment to listen, listening to communities, rather than just like, prescribing solutions based on like, based solely on like, labels that like might be like, put on them by society. 

And I think especially like the idea of, like, empathy and humanity are really central to this vision. I feel like, throughout, throughout my law degree, like, sometimes it’s kind of, here’s what you have to focus on these very like intellectually see, like, quote, unquote, intellectually serious kind of ideas like rationality. 

But I think throughout, like the three years, especially in the modules that I’ve taken in final year, like, it’s really helped me understand, like, this idea of, like empathy kind of is transformative, and it is as intellectually serious as, like, any other idea, and it’s a rigorous, necessary foundation for like legal for legal thinking and legal practice as well. 

Another thing a part of like justice is that, something I see right now is that, like too often, like legal systems are shaped like by fear, and I’m thinking about like around the world, like the rollback of rights under pressure from like far right movement, and how, as a result, like in Scotland, in the UK, perhaps like laws or policies are becoming a bit weaker to kind of like in response to that. 

But Justice has to be like, and also as well about like, issues of like equality and justice can easily be sidelined in terms of, like, self interested, like, party politics, um, but justice has to be braver than that. 

It has to put people in their dignity at the centre of the conversation. It can’t just be like, moved aside because, like, it’s become politically inconvenient, like it should always be at the core of what anybody’s doing. 

And as I’ve kind of already alluded to, like, I don’t think that law alone can carry this burden of like, striving for justice. It is definitely an important part, but I think justice requires more than just legal reform. It needs like, moral imagination, and sustained, inclusive activism. 

And so law is a tool that must be wielded alongside, like storytelling, organising, mutual aid, like education, care, like all of these other kind of aspects, a lot of it comes from, like the community, and I think that’s how real change and real justice happens.

Jen Ang

And that concludes today’s episode, in which a number of prominent Scottish activists sat down to talk to us about what justice looks like for them, and for their communities, under the law.  Some big ideas and inspiring visions here – which I hoped sparked some curious thinking on your part, the listener. 

What does it mean if we hold a vision of justice that is separate to the law and the legal system as we know today? What is the impact for those who are excluded?  And what about for the rest of us?  Does the answer to bridging this gap lie within the law, or outside of it?

Big questions, and I’d love to hear what you, our listeners, make of it all, and indeed of this special three-part episode on equality under the law.

Meanwhile, a very big thank you to Heather Fisken, Tressa Burke, Pheona Matovu, Satwat Rehman, Talat Yaqoob, Pinar Aksu, Davie Donaldson and Amanda Amaeshi for their contributions to today’s episode.

And thanks so much to you, the listener for tuning into our Lawmanity podcast and our special series on Equality Under the Law in Scotland.

If you loved this podcast, please do hit the subscribe buttons, and also like and share our episodes with friends and colleagues who might enjoy learning a little bit about how law really works in practice, and how it can be used to make the world a better, brighter place.  

Our Equality Under the Law series has been generously support by a grant from the Atlantic Fellows for Social and Economic Equity, hosted by the London School of Economics.  The Lawmanity podcast is co-produced by me, your host, Jen Ang and by the brilliant and talented Natalia Uribe.  And the music you’ve been listening to is “Always on the Move” by Musicians in Exile, a Glasgow-based music project led by people seeking refuge in Scotland.  

Thanks so much for tuning in today, we hope you enjoyed listening, and see you next time!