Alison Saunders

Dame Alison Margaret Saunders, DCB (née Brown; born 14 February 1961) is a British barrister and a former Director of Public Prosecutions. She was the first lawyer from within the Crown Prosecution Service and the second woman to hold the appointment. She was also the second holder of this office not to be a Queen's Counsel. She was previously the Chief Crown Prosecutor for CPS London. Her term of office ended 31 October 2018.[1] She is now a Partner at the Magic Circle law firm Linklaters.

Crown Prosecution Service

On 23 July 2013, it was announced that she would become the new Director of Public Prosecutions in succession to Sir Keir Starmer, taking up the appointment on 1 November 2013. She was the first head of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to be appointed from within the service and the second woman to hold the appointment.

As the Director of Public Prosecutions, Saunders faced criticism and controversy around the handling of trials for rape and sexual assault. The CPS has been criticised for the case of Eleanor de Freitas, who killed herself after the CPS decided to take over a private prosecution brought against her by the man she accused of rape. Saunders said that the "evidence in this case was strong and having considered it in light of all of our knowledge and guidance on prosecuting sexual offences and allegedly false rape claims, it is clear there was sufficient evidence for a realistic prospect of conviction for perverting the course of justice". Saunders stated that the number of rape prosecutions being brought to court would increase by a third in the year 2015 and argued that this increase follows improvements in the treatment received by victims by police, courts and the CPS.

In 2014, Saunders announced that the CPS would be seeking to fight against criminals hiding assets abroad and appointed a team of six specialist lawyers to work with legal authorities overseas to recover assets from countries including Spain and the United Arab Emirates.[14]

In April 2015, Saunders was criticized for her decision not to prosecute Greville Janner on child sexual abuse charges despite his meeting the evidential test for prosecution, citing his poor health, as well as for dropping charges against nine journalists as part of the Operation Elveden case. Saunders defended herself saying, "I'm not here to make popular decisions. I always feel under pressure to make the right decision."[15] In June 2015, The Guardian reported that, following a review, the decision not to prosecute Lord Janner would in fact be overturned. Simon Danczuk, then MP for Rochdale, told the Guardian that "if the report is accurate, Saunders will now have to consider her position" as a result of the scrutiny that her initial decision would now be placed under.[16] The decision marks the first time a DPP has had a major prosecuting decision reviewed and overturned. Amid calls for her resignation, she told the BBC that she would not resign.[17] Saunders blamed failings within her department and the police for the collapse of three different police inquiries between 1991 and 2007. Theresa May (then the home secretary, later Prime Minister) said in a radio interview: “I was very concerned when I heard about this decision. It is not my decision, it is entirely a decision for the director of public prosecutions.”[18]

In 2015, a case was brought against Saunders in the High Court. The complainant, Nikki Kenward, argued that Saunders had amended prosecution policy outside of the democratic process.[19] Saunders released the alleged amendment in October, 2014. In it she suggested that the guidelines on assisted suicide prosecution be understood such that a doctor who is not the patient's immediate care provider, should not be as likely to face prosecution as a doctor who is the patient's immediate care provider. This prompted a backlash from anti-assisted suicide groups who argued that this was a substantial change, which would allow for businesses similar to Dignitas to operate in the UK. Saunders' defence was that she had only clarified the existing guidelines.[20] Nevertheless, Kenward was granted the judicial review against Saunders in April, 2015.[19] It went to the High Court in November 2015; the case against Saunders was dismissed.[21]

In 2018 Saunders was paid a salary of between £210,000 and £214,999.[22] On 2 April 2018 it was announced that Saunders was to stand down at the end of her term as head of the CPS.[23] On 1 November 2018, she was succeeded as Director of Public Prosecutions by Max Hill QC.[24]

In June 2015, Saunders was accused by journalist Julia Hartley-Brewer of a crusade to criminalise "drunken sexual encounters".[25] In December 2017, Daily Telegraph journalist Allison Pearson called for Saunders to resign following the scandal of several high-profile rape cases falling apart or convictions being overturned due to police withholding key information regarding the innocence of the accused.[26]

Conversely, on 23 January 2018, Saunders was criticised by victims and survivors' groups because her words could be taken to mean that silence equates to consent.[27]

After it was announced that Saunders would not be reappointed for a second term, The Daily Telegraph reported, in April 2018, that crime statistics tracking burglary, violent crime and shoplifting all rose significantly under Saunders' tenure as Director of Public Prosecutions.[28]

On 29 December 2018, The Telegraph reported that Saunders would be "the first former head of the Crown Prosecution Service not to receive a senior honour after her tenure was marked by a series of scandals". However, Saunders was named a Dame Commander of the Order of the Bath (DCB) in the 2020 New Year Honours and later invested.[29]

A week after Saunders stepped down as head of the CPS, it was announced that the CPS had agreed to a five-figure settlement with broadcaster Paul Gambaccini, who was arrested as part of Operation Yewtree and bailed repeatedly for a year over unfounded sex charges before being told he would not be charged. Samuel Armstrong, a former Conservative MP's chief of staff who was acquitted of rape, said the settlement was a "damning indictment [that] should act as the final nail in the coffin for her hopes of a damehood ... Saunders' one-woman crusade to shift the scales of justice in sex cases not only ruined the lives of dozens of young men but of Paul Gambaccini as well."[30]

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General Information

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Misandry

Misandry is the hatred of, pathological aversion to, or prejudice against men. The first recorded use of the term dates from the 19th century. At the present time misandry is widespread in Western society but may be in decline.

These days it seems you don't need to look far to see negativity focused at men. What is often known as casual misandry permeates western civilisation where many men and women commonly make negative statements about men without apparently regarding this as a problem or being challenged by anyone else present. This problem has steadily deteriorated and we have now reached the point that books with titles such as Are Men Necessary? When Sexes Collide and The End of Men can be published without significant objection from the wider community.

Negative and inaccurate portrayals of men and boys have permeated mainstream media and online knowledge repositories such as Wikipedia, where the bias is particularly evident. Wikipedia editors routinely write negative commentaries about men and Wikipedia admins protect those commentaries while censoring counter-narratives that might show less biased, more accurate information. This practice is reinforced by feminist editing gangs who congregate in regular 'edit-a-thons' with the sole purpose of increasing feminist ideology within Wikipedia articles, and to censor male-positive discourse and research on men. In a nutshell those in control of Wikipedia have succeeded in deplatforming much reliable information about men and boys.

Issues

The Men's Rights Movement exists to raise awareness of and to address certain problems facing men and boys.

Bodily Autonomy

Female genital mutilation is now illegal in many countries, and international organisations work to reduce this practice. These same societies often refuse to grant boys the same bodily autonomy that they grant girls - the right to be protected from unnecessary medical procedures. The men's rights movement objects to male genital mutilation (also known as circumcision) on the same grounds as female genital mutilation. Both violate the human rights of the individual being mutilated and both should be illegal. In many countries today all individuals have protection from unnecessary medical procedures except for infant boys. That the foreskin is removed in most cases without anesthetic exacerbates the problem.

Many do not know that the foreskins of infant boys are not destroyed as medical waste but are rather put to a variety of uses. While it is true a few are used for medical research the majority go to cosmetic companies. In some countries the sale of foreskins by hospitals is a lucrative business.

We want: Infant boys to have the same protection from medically unnecessary procedures as are extended to the rest of the community.

Disposability

All societies consider men to be disposable. Men are drafted and can be forced in to combat against their will. Men overwhelmingly take on the dangerous jobs in society. In general men are expected to be prepared to give up their life for the good of the community and, specifically, to protect the lives of women. This is so ingrained that few people, men or women, recognise it. Fewer still object to it.

The MRM rejects male disposability in the modern world. While it may have made sense for a society in the past to be prepared to sacrifice it's men for the survival of the society, the MRM holds that this is no longer necessary. With a population exceeding seven billion that might reach 10 or 11 billion in a few decades, we no longer need the ability to quickly recover numbers and so the original reason that male disposability existed is no longer present.

We want: An end to the expectation of male disposability.

Domestic Violence

Today domestic violence is often also called Intimate Partner Violence (IPV). Men constitute between one third and one half of all victims of domestic violence. A similar proportion of domestic violence aggressors are women. In a significant proportion of cases each partner is both a perpetrator and victim of domestic violence. The notion that domestic violence is a gendered issue is simply not supported by the evidence. We object to all domestic violence regardless of the genders of the people involved.

• We want: Recognition from society that domestic violence is not a gendered issue
• We want: Domestic Violence services that properly supports victims regardless of their gender.
• We want: Domestic Violence services that help aggressors regardless of their gender.

Education

The performance of boys in primary and high school education system has been declining for decades. Decades ago boys tended to consistently perform better in primary and high school than girls. Educators set out to change primary and high schooling to improve the results for girls. The problem is that they continued to do this even after it was clear that boys were falling behind.

Education research clearly shows that boys tend to do better in exam assessment and girls tend to do better in in-class assessment. Relative performance in male and female students can be tracked with changing assessment. There has been a clear move away from exams and towards in-class assessment in the last few decades. One notable exception was a recent reversal of this trend in the UK. As expected the performance of boys in the UK improved with the increase in exam assessment.

Increasingly students have less and less time to burn off energy and are expected to sit quietly in the classroom for hours at a time. This is sometimes characterised as the incredible shrinking lunchtime. While this is probably impacting many students negatively the evidence suggests this is generally more of a problem for boys. It is interesting that this should be happening at a time when office workers are entreated to stand and move around more for their long term health.

Alarmingly research shows that in recent years teachers have been academically marking down students with behavioural problems. This has overwhelmingly impacted boys.

The MRM objects to significant gender biases in primary and high school education systems and seeks to reform the system in to one in which boys and girls can benefit.

The problems don't end there. Men have been abandoning the dream of a university education in droves, partly because many university campuses have become very hostile for men. In the US many universities, if a man is accused of sexual assault against a woman he is not afforded council, to know the details of the allegation or even to know the name of his accuser. He then has the onus of proof placed on him. It is not surprisingly that the bulk of such accusation result in the male student being expelled or banned from campus, which generally results in them failing courses.

In most western countries men now constitute less than 40% of university enrollments. While increasing the female participation rates in certain STEM fields is actively promoted there is little interest in addressing the falling university participation rate among men.

• We want: A recognition in primary and high school that, while there is overlap, boys and girls do tend to behave differently as children as a result of physiological differences and for the education system to accommodate both boys and girls in a way that allows all children to thrive.
• We want: A university system that is not hostile to young men.

Father's Rights

The family court system in many countries is heavily biased in favour of mothers. In many countries courts still show a strong preference for granting custody to mothers over fathers. Non-custodial fathers often find themselves with very limited access to their children and routinely find that breaches of court orders by mothers (such as not allowing visits in accordance with court orders) are ignored or receive only a token response from authorities. Many men fight in court for years to get reasonable access to their children, only to give up in dispair when they realise the system has failed them.

• We want: Shared custody arrangements unless compelling reasons exist to show that this is not feasible.
• We want: Sufficient access for parents not living with their children for a parent-child relationship to be maintained.
• We want: Enforcement of family court orders on just terms and fair terms.

Health

Males have higher mortality rates at every age. The difference in life expectancy for men and women actually widened during most of the 20th century, peaking in the 1990s. One significant contributor to this is the far greater amount spent on women's health than men's health.

• We want: Fair allocation of resources to health problems facing men and women.
• We want: Public recognition that both genders need their gender-specific health issues addressed adequately.

State Discrimination

Even when the evidence against men and women are the same men are more likely to be arrested for an offence, more likely to be charged with an offence, more likely to be convicted of an offence, more likely to receive a custodial sentence, and the sentence will on average be longer. Some states openly advocate on this basis. A UK government commission recently advocated the abolition of all women's prisons. One of the advantages, they argued, was that these prisons could then be used to incarcerate more men.

Laws that are written in a gender neutral way are often not applied that way, and this most often is to the detriment of men.

In Canada these is a special offence for a woman who kills her own newborn, that limits the sentence to five years imprisonment. A major children's charity in Canada opposes this, arguing that a newborn should have the same right to protection from violence as any other member of the community. We fully support their position.

• We want: Genuine gender-neutrality in the application of the criminal justice system.

Reproductive Rights

Today men actually lack reproductive rights. Unlike women, in many western countries, men cannot choose not to be a father. In the United States there have been numerous cases in which a boy has had sex with an adult woman. The boy was not legally able to consent to the sexual activity and yet when the woman became pregnant the boy was required to pay child support.

Many men have been ordered by courts to continue supporting a child that is not theirs, even after they present conclusive evidence (such as the results of a DNA test) showing that they are not the biological father of the child, and in some cases had no relationship with the child at all.

• We want: Men to have the same reproductive rights as women.
• We want: Child support payments to be managed by the courts in a fair and just manner.

Suicide

Men and boys have suicide rates several times higher than women and girls. Male suicide rates have grown at a far faster rate than female suicide rates over the last century. While the of high levels of suicide rates among men has gained recognition within the last few years there is still a long way to go in addressing this serious problem.

• We want: Society and government to act to address the underlying causes of the rising suicide rate among men.

Unnecessary Medication

Children, and boys in particular, are being diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and drugged at an alarming rate. This rate has been increasing rapidly in recent years, which is prompting an increase in the sales of drugs to treat the condition. In the United States, for example, sales of ADHD drugs have increased by 89% in four years.

The long term consequences of ADHD medicating on a forming brain are not yet known.

The MRM is concerned that the normal behaviour of many young boys is being considered abnormal and medicated.

This is not to say that all diagnosis for this condition are invalid, but when the diagnosis rate is changing as rapidly as is currently occurring more needs to be done than simply prescribing more drugs.

We want: A proper analysis of why ADHD diagnosis rates are skyrocketing.

Vilification

We live in a society that routinely vilifies masculinity. The TV formula so often seen in sitcoms of a stupid or inept (but often well meaning) man married to a super woman who can solve all of his problems for him by the end of the episode is so common it is almost a cliche. The mass media is full of negative portrays of men. The news media is constantly telling us about negative aspects of masculinity. This has led to a general perception of men as people to be feared and suspected. This had led many airlines to maintain a policy of never seating unaccompanied minors next to men. The implicit assumption here seems to be that the men cannot be trusted next to a child. Many men report feeling uneasy around children, fearful that they will be accused of some terrible act. This is a major cause of men avoiding certain industries, such as childcare.

A series of t-shirts and other products produced in the United States a few years ago suggested Boys are stupid, throw rocks at them. The manufacturers took no regard for the impact their products would have on young minds.

A very concerning problem relates to the distribution of food following disasters. Many relief agencies believe that if food is given to men they will keep it for themselves rather than provide food to their relatives and children. Both the United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR) and USAID exclude men from food distribution centres on the basis of gender alone. Men and boys may not enter the food distribution centres. Women are permitted to enter and are then expected to distribute the food to their relatives. These organisations claim that special provision is made for families with no female members but they are light on details. It seems unlikely that in the hectic environment of a disaster food distribution centre that the staff would have time to properly investigate the claims of men and boys that they have no women in their family. There is anecdotal evidence to suggest these men and boys are simply excluded from the food distribution.

• We want: An end to the vilification of masculinity in the public sphere.

Violence

Men experience high levels of violence in society and there is very little recognition of this. Men are close to twice as likely to experience violence in public as women, even though it is women (we are so often told) need to be fearful walking alone at night. The rates of rape of males exceeds that of females if prison rape is included in the statistics. Female-on-male violence is an often ignored problem. Some women, having been taught that violence is gendered, simultaneously object to violence against women but feel that violence against men is inconsequential. One often repeated myth is that a woman cannot physically harm a man. The many men injured and killed by women are a testiment to the erroneous nature of this statement.

Society and the government both ignore and marginalise male victims of violence.

• We want: Public recognition that violence against everyone is wrong.