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Southampton Law School

Quarterly Research Highlights

Published: 22 June 2016

View a selection of current and recent research activity in the School of Law. More details about these and other researchers, projects, publications, events, etc. and about the work of our Research centres, can be found via the Law School research index page and the academic staff pages.

Centre for Health, Ethics and Law (HEAL)

Natasha Hammond-Browning

On July 4th and 5th, HEAL’s major academic event of the year, organized by Drs. Hammond-Browning and Lougarre, will be a workshop on Reproductive Futures: Reproductive Choices? Speakers will be invited to submit their contributions to a special issue of Contemporary Issues in Law. During this workshop, Dr. Hammond-Browning will be presenting a paper on ‘Should ectogenesis be a reproductive choice?’ and Dr. Lougarre will be presenting a paper on 'Is there really a right to reproductive health in human rights law?’

In September, Dr Natasha Hammond-Browning has been invited to speak at a conference on ‘The Ethics of Uterus Transplantation’ at Lancaster University, organised by Professor Stephen Wilkinson and Professor Rosamund Scott. Natasha will be presenting a paper on ‘Undue concern about uterus transplantation, or is ectogenesis the way forward?’

A. M. Viens

On June 9th, Professor Coggon and Dr. Viens – along with a collaborator from the UK Faculty of Public Health – will be co-organising and co-convening the first of three workshops arising out of their ERSC IAA grant on Strengthening Ethics Capacity and Capability in the UK Public Health Workforce: Promoting Learning, Education and Training in Public Health Ethics and Law.

In late September, both Drs. Lougarre and Viens have been invited to participate in a EU-funded project, New Human Rights for the 21st Century, running from 2016-18, which will largely involve attending workshops and producing a book chapter. Dr. Lougarre will be writing on sexual health and human rights law and Dr. Viens will be writing on the right to bodily integrity.

Dr. Viens and Professor Coggon (along with Professor Syrett at Cardiff University) have submitted the manuscript for their book, Public Health Law: Ethics, Policy and Regulation, to Routledge, which will be published in late 2016 or early 2017.

Dr. Viens is co-Investigator on a University of Southampton project (based out of Geography) looking at ecological citizenship and antimicrobial resistance with respect to waste water that has been awarded a NAMRIP Pump Priming grant of £19,723.

Hazel Biggs

Professor Biggs has co-authored two papers: RA Wheeler, S Blackburn, H Biggs, ‘When might an operative complication be regarded as acceptable? Part 2: Judicial factors that influence the finding of fault during surgical litigation,’ Ann R Coll Surg Engl 2015 97(3): 180-183 and H Biggs & S Ost, ‘I Love You! I do, I do, I do, I do, I do: Breaches of Sexual Boundaries by Patients in their Relationships with Healthcare Professionals,’ in C. Stanton et al. (eds.) Pioneering Healthcare Law: Essays in Honour of Margaret Brazier (London: Routledge, 2015), pp. 91-102.

Professor Biggs has two forthcoming pieces within the Ethical Judgements: Re-Writing Medical Law collection, edited by Stephen Smith, John Coggon, Clark Hobson, Richard Huxtable, Sheelagh McGuinness, Jose Miola and Mary Neal, entitled ‘Legal Commentary – Living and Letting Die: Harmful Intentions and the Best Interests of Anthony Bland’ and ‘Ethical Judgment – R (on the Application of Axon) v Secretary of State for Health [2006] EWHC 37 (Admin)’.

Claire Lougarre

Dr. Lougarre presented her research at the Law and Society Association annual conference in New Orleans in early June on ‘Protecting the right to health of non-nationals: Bridging the gap through supranational monitoring’.

On June 16th, the Global Health Research Institute at the University of Southampton is holding a workshop, entitled Exploring Commonalities in Global Health Research. In the Right to Health/Governance/Ethics theme, coordinated by Dr. Lougarre, Professor Lisa Forman (University of Toronto) will present her views on ‘The right to health and global health policy’, with Professor Coggon acting as respondent.

See above for reference to Dr. Lougarre’s collaboration with Natasha Hammond-Browning in the HEAL workshop Reproductive Futures on July 4th and 5th, and with A.M. Viens the EU-funded project New Human Rights for the 21st Century.

John Coggon

Professor Coggon was successful in obtaining a grant from the Wellcome Trust for a research trip to Australia to collaborate on a project entitled ‘Developing an Ethical Framework for the Implementation of Public Health Regulation’ [£4170].

Institute of Criminal Justice Research (ICJR)

Harry Annison is currently engaged in a research project entitled ‘Penal Policymaking under the Coalition’, and will present initial findings at the British Society of Criminology annual conference as part of a ‘Policymaking, Politics and Criminal Justice Panel’ that he has co-ordinated. Activities following the ESRC/Political Studies Association-funded ‘Interpreting Penal Policymaking’ symposium in April 2016 continue. A Summary Report was published in June 2016 and is available here. In order to further develop his research on penal politics and policymaking, Dr Annison will take up a one-term Visiting Fellowship at the Centre for Criminology, Oxford University in October 2016.

David Gurnham is currently collaborating with Harry Annison and Mark Telford in a research project entitled ‘Sexual scripts, sexual coercion and gender: a study of young peoples’ perceptions’. David presented initial findings at the Law and Society Association meeting in New Orleans in June.

Phil Palmer is currently collaborating with John Coggon on an Alzheimers’ Society Project Grant (£188,000), ‘Using Global Positioning System (GPR) Technologies for Safer Walking: a participative inquiry project’, led by Dr Ruth Bartlett (Health Sciences).

Insurance Law Research Group (ILRG)

Johanna Hjalmarsson and James Davey have co-authored an article ‘Flagship plan to rescue flood hit home owners already looks out of its depth (2016) The Conversation, 14 January 2016.

James Davey and Johanna Hjalmarsson are also leading an Insurance Fraud event to take place this summer, which will establish a centre-to-centre link with the Rutgers Centre for Risk & Responsibility.

Institute for Law and the Web (ILAWS)

Sophie Stalla-Bourdillon

Dr. Stalla Bourdillon is currently leading a number of research projects: Horizon 2020 – Future Trust (400 000 euros for 3 years starting in June); Social biases on the Web – a Web Science pump-priming project (Jan – March 2016) and a Strategic fund project, with Steffen Staab (Co-I) and Laura German (postdoc researcher) on-going; Workshop on Data mining and data sharing practices (funded by Elsevier and Bileta).

Dr Stalla-Bourdillon is also co-I on a number of other projects: Anonymisation practices (PI: Kieron O’Hara, £5000 funding) – Web Science pump-priming project, involving two workshops (March and July 2016); Effective Data Anonymisation Techniques – CGHQ (PI: Vladimiro Sassone), £225,000 for 36 months, which started in May.

Institute of Maritime Law (IML)

Andrew Serdy’s book, ‘The New Entrants Problem in International Fisheries Law’ is now published (March 2016) by Cambridge University Press. Professor Serdy has also published an article "Implementing Article 28 of the UN Fish Stocks Agreement: The First Review of a Conservation Measure in the South Pacific Regional Fisheries Management Organisation" (2016) 47 Ocean Development & International Law 1-28

Mikis Tsimplis is collaborating with Dr. Emily Reid and Dr. Johanna Hjalmarsson to lead a workshop on Atmospheric Pollution at Southampton in July. Themes to be discussed involve: Atmosphere Pollution Mapping – How does Southampton fare?; The legal rights of the person, State responsibility and atmospheric pollution; The maritime sector and atmospheric pollution; Atmospheric pollution and the broader transportation sector.

Research highlights involving other academic colleagues in the School of Law

Brenda Hannigan

Professor Hannigan led a workshop on regulation and company law at the University of Southampton in June. Details to follow.

Sara Benedi Lahuerta

‪Dr Benedi Lahuerta has been awarded £3000 from the ESRC Impact Acceleration Account for a joint project with Dr Ania Zbyszewska (University of Warwick) entitled 'Rethinking EU Equality Law: Towards a More Coherent and Sustainable Regime'. The project will bring together academics, policymakers and other stakeholders in two seminars to be held in April/May and September 2017.‬‬

Dr Benedi Lahuerta is also presenting three lectures this summer: 'The effective enforcement of EU non-discrimination law within and outside courts, Doctoral Inaugural Lecture', University of Leicester, 25 May.; 'Taking EU equality law to the next level: in search of coherence and better enforcement', within the Seminar for University Professors and Law Lecturers: Current Reflections on EU Anti-Discrimination Law, 6-7 June, organised by the Academy of European Law, Trier‬; 'Setting the Scene: Challenges in the field of equality law', within the conference: Strengthening the effectiveness of European Equal Treatment Legislation, organised by the European Network of Equality Bodies (Equinet), 16 June 2016, Brussels.

Peter Sparkes

The European Parliament accepted the report written by Professor Sparkes and Mark Jordan on Cross Border Acquisition. They presented their report, entitled ‘Cross border Acquisitions of Residential Property: Problems that Arise for Citizens’ to the Legal Affairs Committee in Brussels in April. This will be followed-up by a TENLAW conference in Tarragona (September), a conference in Barcelona on the mortgage crisis in fringe EU countries (October) and a meeting in Lecce (November).

Professor Sparkes also presented a paper on Adverse Possession – at a meeting of the SLS Property and trusts section at the Old Court Room Lincoln’s Inn in June, with a view to a response to the Law Com consultation on updating the LRA 2002.

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