Last night’s launch by the (Not Very) Good Law Project of a new crowdfunder – in support of a possible legal challenge in defence of services provided by the controversial, Singapore-based online transgender clinic GenderGP – brings the total number of such crowdfunders launched by the GLP since March 2017 to a magnificent 70. So now seems a good time to take stock of what this platinum grade grifting has actually achieved.

To get us started, here’s my updated Table of Failure and Futility (TOFF), showing the sum raised by and outcome to date of the 70 crowdfunders, in which dark green = clear court win for the GLP; light green = other positive/productive outcome; dark orange = clear court defeat for the GLP; light orange = other negative/unproductive outcome; and grey = still in progress/other.

OK, there is some green, especially in the early years after Jolyon created the GLP in March 2017. But, ultimately, have these few court ‘wins’ actually made any difference? Is the UK a better, fairer and greener place, thanks to this crowdfunded lawfare?

Well, to start at the top of my TOFF, there’s no dispute that the GLP’s very first crowdfunded case – their legal challenge to Uber’s evasion of VAT – was a solid success: while the GLP’s court claim ended in failure, HMRC subsequently assessed Uber for £635 million of VAT. Which must go at least some way to balancing out whatever sums Jolyon prevented HMRC getting their hands on during his prematurely curtailed but evidently highly successful career as a tax (avoidance) lawyer.

In contrast, the GLP’s two big Brexit ‘wins’ – the Wightman case in December 2018, about whether the May government’s Article 50 notification of March 2017 was revocable, and the Prorogation case in September 2019 – achieved absolutely nothing: the UK still left the EU in January 2020.

Furthermore, there had never been any real doubt that, legally and/or politically, Theresa May and her government could revoke the Article 50 notification, if they wanted to: France and Germany were never going to say, “Oh, no, sorry, we can’t let you do that”. And it is arguable that, in bringing their legal challenge to Boris Johnson’s prolonged Prorogation of Parliament, Jolyon and the GLP were simply dancing to the ‘remainer elite’ tune then being blasted out of Downing Street windows by Dominic Cummings. Whatever, given where we are now, Jolyon and the GLP may as well have thrown the £398,620 of crowdfunded donations down the toilet.

Were it not for the arrival of Covid19 a few months later, the story of the GLP might have ended there – much like the life of the fox that Jolyon found in his garden on Boxing Day in 2019. But, thanks to Boris Johnson, Dominic Cummings and Matt Hancock, between April 2020 and January 2022 the GLP raised a stonking £2.491 million from no fewer than 18 Covid19-related crowdfunders.

Yet not one of those 18 crowdfunders resulted in a clear court win for the GLP, and only two can be said to have had any kind of positive outcome for the GLP. In February 2021, the GLP’s ‘Transparency’ case concluded with the High Court issuing a near-meaningless ‘declaration’ that the Government had not fully complied with transparency rules on the publishing of Covid19-related contracts.

And in January 2022, the GLP’s ‘VIP Lane’ case concluded with the High Court ruling that the operation of the High Priority Lane for the awarding of PPE contracts early in the pandemic was “in breach of the obligation of equal treatment”; however, the Court refused to grant a declaration (sought by the GLP) that the High Priority Lane itself was unlawful, having concluded that all the contracts in question were “highly likely” to have been awarded in any event. This judgment was such a damp squib that the GLP sought to appeal it, but in April 2022 the Court of Appeal refused permission, having concluded that the GLP’s appeal had “no prospect of success”.

In short, while the High Court’s nuanced judgment of January 2022 has since enabled Jolyon and the GLP to repeatedly – but inaccurately and disingenuously – refer to “the unlawful VIP lane”, there has been absolutely no benefit to taxpayers or anyone else from these two cases. Indeed, were I not such a generous, kind and fair-minded person, I might well have shaded them light or even dark orange, rather than light green, in my TOFF. Because what’s the point of winning, if there’s no prize?

Moving on down my TOFF, the GLP has had some success in Environment-related cases, with their 2020 Fossil Fuels case leading to the Government reviewing its Energy National Policy Statement. But their March 2023 win in the Supreme Court simply overturned a Shrewsbury Town Council planning decision. And their July 2022 win in the High Court, on Net Zero, proved to be such a hollow victory that, just 12 months later, they had to take the Government back to court because “it’s new Net Zero strategy (which we compelled through our Net Zero I legal challenge) doesn’t contain enough information for the public and Parliament to properly scrutinise its policies.”

This second legal challenge to the Government’s Net Zero strategy was heard by the High Court in February, and judgment is awaited. But with the Government set to be booted out of office and replaced by a Labour government with a Net Zero strategy of its own just a few weeks or months from now, even a clear court win for the GLP will have little if any lasting impact.

Finally, thanks to a mysterious series of very large donations from an anonymous donor (or donors), the GLP helped fund the successful defence, by law firm Bindmans, of a libel claim against Nina Cresswell. And their judicial review of a decision by the General Medical Council was conceded by the GMC on procedural grounds (though the GMC may yet go on to simply affirm the original decision in question).

And all this for just £5.368 million!

If that £5.368 million had been my money, I would definitely be feeling a bit short-changed. And a growing number of those who’ve been beguiled by Jolyon’s platinum-grade grifting since March 2017 now seem to feel much the same way: the average number of donors to a GLP crowdfunder has fallen from 7,640 in late 2020, and 3,260 in mid-2021, to just 850 in 2024 to date. As a result, on current trends, the GLP’s annual income from crowdfunders is set to shrink from £1.863 million in 2021/22, and £633K in 2023/24, to just £275K in 2024/25.

Such rapidly diminishing returns suggest we may not see another 70 GLP crowdfunders.

Oh dear, how sad, never mind.