tree_and_leaf (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
tree_and_leaf) wrote2006-05-08 04:51 pm
tree_and_leaf) wrote2006-05-08 04:51 pm
I'm not a lawyer, but...
... something about one of the current Archers storyline is puzzling me (and it's not the question of why Ruth-the-Geordie-farmer's-wife wants to keep a picture of Usha-the-solicitor snogging Alan-the-vicar; I don't want to go there).
Rather, it's this: I had always understood that gambling debts were unenforceable. Fair enough, a gentleman pays his debts, but as far as I'm concerned Matt Crawford (who is by no means a gentleman, though I am rather disappointed by his descent into stage villany) forfeited his right to the money when he started using it to try to blackmail his debtor, Alistair the Wet Vet, into destroying an perfectly good racehorse, and aiding and abetting an insurance fraud into the bargain. It didn't seem to occur to that idiot Alistair that had he given in, far from it wiping the slate clean, it would have given Matt an even bigger hold over him; however, his conscience prevented him from doing so and he is now desperately trying to find the money.
So is the unenforcability of gambling debts a myth? Has the law changed? Can one really sue over I.O.U.s given as payment for gambling debts?
(Of course, this probably makes very little sense to most of those of you reading this, unless you are a regular Radio 4 listener and given to considering radio's longest running soap - although I think, according to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
weymss, it's on the Wizarding Wireless Network too, now...)
Rather, it's this: I had always understood that gambling debts were unenforceable. Fair enough, a gentleman pays his debts, but as far as I'm concerned Matt Crawford (who is by no means a gentleman, though I am rather disappointed by his descent into stage villany) forfeited his right to the money when he started using it to try to blackmail his debtor, Alistair the Wet Vet, into destroying an perfectly good racehorse, and aiding and abetting an insurance fraud into the bargain. It didn't seem to occur to that idiot Alistair that had he given in, far from it wiping the slate clean, it would have given Matt an even bigger hold over him; however, his conscience prevented him from doing so and he is now desperately trying to find the money.
So is the unenforcability of gambling debts a myth? Has the law changed? Can one really sue over I.O.U.s given as payment for gambling debts?
(Of course, this probably makes very little sense to most of those of you reading this, unless you are a regular Radio 4 listener and given to considering radio's longest running soap - although I think, according to
weymss, it's on the Wizarding Wireless Network too, now...)
no subject
1. He doesn't know they aren't legally enforcable.
2. He knows Matt has some very serious muscle behind him.
3. He was also (IIRC) gambling on the Internet using a credit card. Now those debts will be enforcable. Could Matt have lent him money to cover those debts?
4. He knows that a member of the Archer clan is going to save the day sooner or later. No doubt casseroles will be involved.
Can't throw any light on the legality of it, though, alas.
no subject
I got the impression that the credit card debts were a seperate issue - but what you suggest is possible. On the other hand, I got the impression that it was suggested that the reason Ali's debts with Matt are so high is that Matt has been cheating and he was too dim to notice (this is the same man who failed to notice that his partner was dealing drugs from the practice). But I may have made that bit up.
Matt clearly wants, if not murdered, than horsewhipped and driven out of the county. I used to be ambivalent on him - he was better than Lilian's usual type - but I tend to agree with Peter Wimsey's view on blackmailers...
no subject
This may be why I really ought to be in Slytherin, but I also didn’t understand why, Matt having made the doping proposal and Alastair requesting time to think about it, A didn’t go along to the second meeting with a Dictaphone to record lengthy discussions, at the end of which he would have been in a good position to blackmail Matt, possibly to get the money to pay off any separate internet debts. Alternatively, he could have been a good citizen and informed the police, but either way, Matt would not have been in a position to come after him.
no subject
Alistair is a bit of an idiot generally, though - despite the fact that the doping escalated into 'put down my horse and defraud my insurance company', it didn't seem to occur to him the blackmailers don't let you go and that he needed to take some measures to defend himself (and that, in fact, they were fairly simple). But I suppose it's the rabbit in the headlights effect.
But I think it ay be more a 'detective story fan' thing than a Slytherin thing (I bet Hermione reads detective stories).
I suppose the 'not noticing the cheating' might be part of the addiction, though - he needed the gambling, so he subconsciously didn't want to notice that anything was awry.
no subject
Good point. It is a pity for him (though, as you say, he is an idiot, and I shall add, an oaf) that he couldn't just pop along to the Egotists Club and get Lord Peter to come back and sort Matt out.
Ruth keeps a picture of Alan and Usha snogging? The mind boggles. Actually, on that front, I’ve no idea of what the professional qualifications of being a vicar’s wife are outside 1920s TV dramas, but what are the implications of a vicar wanting to marry someone who is an active and practising member of another religion? I’ve always assumed – probably because one bulks out characters from one’s own experience – that Usha’s background was Hindu, but that she is non-practising, in which case we’d merely be Caroline/Robin again, and Susan et al are to be interpreted as bigots. But what if she is actually a member of another faith – from Roman Catholic to Buddhist? Have we a potential industrial tribunal here?
I am not a canon lawyer, but
I'm not totally sure what the CofE's position on mixed-faith marriages is (these days, probably, it's to mutter 'Well, thank God s/he's not gay', and then spend a few minutes feeling conflicted and guilty in a sort of angsty, semi-liberal, 'the theological justifications for banning gay marriage don't stand up all that well, even if Paul...', 'Can't sleep, Forward in Faith will get me' sort of way)
Anyway: marrying Christians of other denominations is not that much of a problem - not a problem at all if they are a member of a church in full communion with Canterbury (eg the Church of Scotland, the Methodists, etc). The difficulty with marrying an RC is more on the Catholic side, but is not insuperable either.
As far as marrying active members of other faiths goes, I think it's OK as long as it's cleared with the bishop. Alan has already had a chat with his bishop, because someone (probably Susan) sent anonymous letters to the bishop denouncing Alan for having it off with a pagan. Cue much theological chinstroking and quoting of St Paul ('the unbelieving wife shall be sanctified by the husband', etc), with a side order of embarassment because they both knew it was far too soon in the realtionship to be talking that way, really. The marriage would have to be in church, though, I think.
But the parish is liable to feel hurt if the Vicar's Wife doesn't play some sort of role in the parish (coming to things, basically). Mind you, the same objection applies to marrying atheists, at least the more militant sort.
I think you're right about Usha, though. I seem to remember a conversation with Alan in which she said something about probably believing in God, but didn't seem to have any theological position beyond that. Anyway, Alan is covered, I think, as he's kept in touch with Bishop Cyril.
And 'Susan is a bigot' is pretty axiomatic, anyway (as for Shula, I suspect a certain amount of ulterior motive, as she's never liked Usha since the Dr Locke debacle. Not that that was Usha's fault, but it's funny how often people start to dislike other people because they've wronged them.) But I suspect Susan would still think the realtionship dodgy even if it suddenly turned out that Usha was a St Thomas Christian, or if she converted. She'd just be stuck for a way to express, since even she isn't stupid enough to think that anyone will be impressed by her claiming the vicar shouldn't marry an Asian....
conflicted and guilty
I think it was The Towers of Trebizond that crystalized for me that as an atheist the one thing I miss through not being the sort of wet, liberal, yet old words adoring Anglican I should otherwise have been, is the opportunity for doubt and guilt (the good sort of self-improvement guilt, obviously, rather than the "Aargh! I'm on the straight road to Hell right now - oh, please don't let me get knocked down on my way home" grim guilt).
it's funny how often people start to dislike other people because they've wronged them
So I suspect it's the guilt. IIRC Usha was pretty - and justifiably - forthright about Shula's Horrible Betrayal, and as Shula would never admit she's wrong about anything, there was no way back for the friendship. So, Sh. thinks, it must be Usha's fault.
I desperately hope that Alan and Usha do get married, because it will end Vicarage Romance in Ambridge for a good ten years, and after Janet'n'Tim, I had had enough (I rather liked the angsty Robin; I remember his horribly awkward last minute backing out of his and Caroline's planned dirty weekend in Birmingham).
Re: conflicted and guilty
Agree re: vicarage romance (though I quite like Alan, despite his ineffectual moments); though I suppose it is true to life for a single clergyman to be an object of gossip: but you can have too much of that! We have met Bp Cyril on occasion: we heard his discussion of the Usha situation (or, more precisely, the poison pen's reaction to it), and I think he sometimes comes to parish things. He also played a speaking part, IIRC, in the Janet'n'Tim debacle.
Poor Robin - do you remember what happened to him?
Robim