Clause 6 - Making of order
Proceeds of Crime Bill
10:00 am
Mr Dominic Grieve (Beaconsfield, Conservative)
The hon. Gentleman said something earlier that is important and may be useful to the Committee. He spoke about the need for the director to have this discretion, but are we not considering two separate ways of recovering assets? We are considering a civil route, which is aimed particularly at those people who do not have convictions, and we are considering a confiscatory route, in which the burden upon the defendant is exceptionally heavy.
In the case of the tachograph offence, does the hon. Gentleman not think that common sense might dictate, not that the assets are not recovered, but that the judge would say that, if assets are to be recovered on the basis of three tachograph offences in six years, the civil recovery route should be taken, in which the defences available to the individual are different and of a better quality?