Judging by recent TV appearances, Dominic Raab MP appears to be employed full-time as Boris Johnson’s chief defender in a succession of awkward interviews.
But he is, you may recall, also the lord chancellor and justice secretary and has been since mid-September last year.
Obiter was interested to know what that entailed, and in particular whether Raab (or his ministerial team) had found the time to visit any court in person, or to meet in a formal capacity a judge, barrister or solicitor. We guessed it was a fairly significant part of the job after all.
In November, we submitted a freedom of information request asking for these details, which would have required little more than a scroll through the diary. The statutory response date was 22 December, and we eagerly awaited this early Christmas present.
Alas, Santa came but he brought bad news: the MoJ said that it could not answer our request within the designated timeframe, but work was ‘ongoing’ and they would respond by 6 January.
Since then? Nothing. Despite repeated prompts for the information. The MoJ has effectively ghosted us, and the legal time limit for responding is now some six weeks past.
We can only presume from the delay that Raab’s diary was so full with meetings and court visits that it has taken a while to collate them. Either that, or he hasn’t made a single visit and his officials are trying to stall for time. Whichever it is, Obiter will continue holding out for an answer.
2 Readers' comments