Clause 20 - No order made: reconsideration of case
Proceeds of Crime Bill
10:30 am
Mr Bob Ainsworth (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Home Office; Coventry North East, Labour)
Amendment No. 63 would prevent clause 20 from being used when the investigating agencies, as defined under amendment No. 106, had evidence relevant to the confiscation proceedings that was not made available to the prosecutor at the original proceedings. Amendments Nos. 64 and 65 would do precisely the same in respect of clause 21, except that that clause covers evidence that was not available to the director as well as evidence that was not available to the prosecutor. Amendment No. 106 would define what constitutes an investigating agency.
Under the existing law, the criterion for the operation of such powers is whether there was evidence that was not available to prosecutor at the time of the original proceedings. It does not matter whether the investigating agency concerned had withheld evidence from the prosecutor at the time for whatever reason.
I cannot think of any reason why an investigating agency should deliberately wish to withhold evidence from the prosecutor or the director in order to prevent a confiscation order from being made. By its nature, an investigating agency will want to ensure not only that the defendant is convicted of his crimes but that all his assets acquired from crime are taken away from him at the same time.
On rare occasions, there may be cases when, through incompetence, evidence may not have been brought to the prosecutor's attention, but that is a different matter. It is not possible to legislate for incompetence. In any event, there must still be a strong case for arguing that a convicted person should not benefit from his crimes simply because the investigating authority was inefficient or incompetent.