Clause 28 - Defence disclosure
Criminal Justice Bill
3:15 pm
Mr Dominic Grieve (Beaconsfield, Conservative)
Amendments Nos. 185, 134, 187, 133, 188, 135, 226, 189, 136, 190 and 227 to clause 28 are designed to improve the Government's proposals, not to wreck them. I want to make that clear. I am completely comfortable with the principle of disclosure
of the principal defence facts. After all, it was introduced in legislation under the previous Conservative Government. A criminal trial, even in an adversarial system, should not be a series of ambushes. Indeed, in my time at the Bar attempts at ambushing merely led to adjournments, which simply spin out court proceedings.
It is plainly desirable, as far is as possible, that the principal facts and matters of a defendant's case should be made available to the prosecution before the trial. It is with that in mind that we tabled amendments to clause 28 and also tabled several amendments jointly with the Liberal Democrats. It may be helpful if I outline to the Minister the key issues in the amendments proposed to the 1996 Act by clause 28.
First, and I saw the Minister nodding in reply to the speech of the hon. Member for Southwark, North and Bermondsey, it is clear that all parties must have an opportunity to make representations. I fully accept that the rules of court may provide for that, but my reason for tabling the amendment is to ensure that we at least have it on record that that is what was intended. We wish to avoid later suggestions, which can happen, that the usual principle of hearing all parties before coming to a decision is not being adhered to.
The present wording is open to the interpretation that disclosure is confined to the prosecutor and to that particular defendant and to nobody else. Some reassurance from the Minister on that would be helpful.
Amendment No. 134 calls for the exchange of a defendant's statement with co-accused to be simultaneous. I will return to this, for there is also provision in this part of the Bill for a subsequent statement. That creates problems. However, it is essential that there is simultaneous exchange of the first statements between defendant and prosecution and that there is a requirement that they should be supplied to co-defendants.
It is possible to deal with that by rules of court, but we should at least consider the issue. We must also accept, and it is a point worth bearing in mind, that there may be circumstances when this cannot happen because the defendant is arrested late, for instance, and brought to trial later when two trials have been consolidated. Clearly, once a structure of exchanging evidence by means of statement setting out people's cases has been formalised, the last person to become involved in that process, if he is one of the co-accused, may have an unfair advantage over the others. That is a loophole that could be exploited by lawyers for the benefit of their clients.