New UKAJI blog guidelines

UKAJI blog guidelines

Objective of UKAJI’s blog

UKAJI’s focus is administrative justice. On our website, we define administrative justice in the following way:

“Administrative justice concerns how we interact as individuals when the government, or those working on its behalf, act in ways that appear wrong, unfair or unjust. It encompasses matters of everyday importance to all of us, such as housing, education, health care, immigration, planning, social security and taxation.”

Therefore, reduced to fundamentals, administrative justice is about ensuring that public bodies and those who exercise public functions make the right decisions and the means of redress available when things go wrong in those decisions.

UKAJI’s ultimate objective is to develop and use research to understand how the systems of administrative justice operate, including such matters as how users experience the systems and the implications of reforms. One of our key goals is to seek to ensure that research can be used to enable the systems to work as they should and that change is informed by robust, independent research evidence.

Content

• UKAJI is interested in publishing material concerning all aspects of administrative justice. In blog contributions, we ask that authors make the connection to administrative justice clear and apparent.
• If there are any doubts as to the relevance of a contribution, please contact Lee Marsons on lm17598@essex.ac.uk for guidance and confirmation.

Without intending to be prescriptive or proscriptive, matters of relevance include:

• Legislation, rules, and policy, and how these influence decision-making and redress mechanisms;
• Initial decision-making by public bodies and their agents (e.g. by central and local government, the NHS, and a variety of government agencies);
• Complaints, internal review, and appeals;
• Redress, including ombuds and reviewers, courts, tribunals, mediation, alternative dispute resolution, and online dispute resolution;
• Advice provision;
• Legal representation, advice, and advocacy;
• Funding and legal aid;
• Feedback from complaints to encourage continuous improvement in service delivery and initial decision-making;
• Human rights and equalities and their connection to governmental decision-making; and
• Health, education, social security, welfare benefits, and housing provision.

Word limit

• UKAJI blogs are normally between 1200 and 1800 words in length, with a preference for around 1500 words.
• For posts longer than 2500 words, UKAJI will normally ask that the contribution is split into multiple posts.

Style and formatting

• Unless referring to the official name of an institution (e.g. Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman), please use the gender neutral ombud (singular) or ombuds (plural) instead of ombudsman or ombudsmen. Similarly, use gender neutral language wherever official designation or accurate quotation does not require otherwise.
• Use full words rather than contractions, unless an accurate quotation requires contractions.
• Use British English spelling.
• For quotations longer than three lines, please indent the quotation. For quotations shorter than three lines, use single quotation marks.

Referencing

• Where possible, please use hyperlinks rather than footnotes or endnotes.
• Please pinpoint specific page, paragraph, or line numbers wherever possible.
• Where a source used is not available online, indicate the source in brackets at the end of the sentence where the source is used. Alternatively, provide a hyperlink to the source on the publisher’s website so that readers may purchase the text or access the source via personal or institutional log-ins.
• A bibliography is not necessary if sources are clearly identified in the main text of the post.

Defamatory material

• UKAJI will not publish defamatory material, or material which is gratuitously offensive, threatening, or abusive.
• The editors of the blog reserve the right to refuse the publication of material that causes concern for reasons additional to those outlined.

Contributor headshot

• Preferably, please provide a clear and recent head-and-shoulders photograph for inclusion in the blog. Photographs taken from institutional websites are satisfactory for these purposes.
• If a contributor does not wish to provide a headshot, please seek to provide an alternative photograph or image connected to the subject matter of the blog.

Contributor details

• Please end the post with a short biographical paragraph outlining your name, institutional affiliation, and an overview of your research interests or professional activities. You may also provide your email address if you are comfortable with this.
• UKAJI has no preference for academic contributors over any other contributors, and would welcome blogs from campaign organisations, think-tanks, charities, or individuals with personal experience of the administrative justice system. Indeed, UKAJI would actively seek to encourage reflection and debate between these various groups and individuals.

Re-blogging

• If the contribution has previously been posted elsewhere or is to be blogged elsewhere simultaneously, please inform UKAJI as soon as possible.
• In principle, UKAJI is happy for its blog pieces to be re-blogged on other websites, but please contact Lee Marsons at lm17598@essex.ac.uk for confirmation of this prior to re-blogging.
• In addition, in the re-blog, please expressly acknowledge UKAJI at the start of the piece with a hyperlink to the original post on the UKAJI website.

Blog timing

• If a contributor wishes their post to be published at a particular time and date, please inform UKAJI as soon as possible. If no preference is expressed, UKAJI will post the blog as soon as practicable after approval by the editors.

Notes

• In these guidelines, ‘editors’ refers to Professor Maurice Sunkin (University of Essex) and Lee Marsons (University of Essex).
• To suggest any alterations to these guidelines or if you have any queries about them, please contact Lee Marsons at lm17598@essex.ac.uk.