Clause 37 - Application by prosecution for
Criminal Justice Bill
3:30 pm
Mr Dominic Grieve (Beaconsfield, Conservative)
Indeed. I would like to draw the Minister out. If that is his anxiety, we need to know about it.
Amendment No. 240 is a consequential amendment, which we need not go into. I should like comment on amendment No. 272, which was tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Hertsmere, who is not here. It is rather sensible. No jury can be found for which it would not be an excessive burden. That brings us to the nub of the issue. Can the Minister bring to the Committee good evidence that there are instances in which no jury can be found for which it would not be an excessive burden to do a six or nine-month case? I am not sure about the lengths of the longest criminal trials to have taken place in this country. It would be useful to know how many trials lasting more than six months there have been in the past year or two. That would be a helpful indication as to the extent of the problem, so that we can decide whether the solution before us is the right one.
Amendment No. 273 is solely about length of trial. Then we come to amendment No. 206, which concerns burdensomeness. Subsection (4)(a) and (b) say two similar but slightly different things. I seek the Minister's help as to what the relationship is between them and how they differ. They bear repetition. They concern instances in which the complexity or length of a trial, or both
''(a) is likely to make the trial so burdensome to the members of a jury hearing the trial that it is necessary in the interests of justice for the trial to be conducted without a jury, or
(b) would be likely to place an excessive burden upon the life of a typical juror.''
I am not convinced that I understand the distinction. I think that paragraph (b) is saying that there is no problem, but it would be so irksome to the juror that there ought not be a jury and paragraph (a) is saying that not only would it be irksome but, in some way, the quality of justice would suffer as a result. Even if I am right, I am not convinced by the argument. Can the Minister explain the relationship?
I would like to draw the Minister out a little on amendment No. 241 and the ''interests of justice''. The interest of justice is that there should be a fair verdict. Is he saying that the current system is not producing
fair verdicts? If not, the phrase should be removed from the clause. It is really all about the convenience of jurors.
Let us be honest, many things are burdensome. It is burdensome to be called up for jury service, though it is a hugely important function for the average citizen and we should celebrate it more than we do and afford it greater recognition within society. It is one of the key elements of participatory democracy. We often speak about devolution in that context, but jury service is one of the best examples of real participatory democracy that I can think of.
I am unconvinced by the phrase ''the interests of justice''. Will the Minister explain how placing a burden on the juror does not serve the interests of justice? On that basis, we could get rid of jury trial altogether: it is bound to be burden on anyone who is called up. The Government do not really mean ''the interests of justice'', so we should call a spade a spade and take it out.
Amendment No. 244 brings us to ''relate to property''. The Minister is laughing, and I am glad to provide him with some mild entertainment in the course of a long afternoon sitting and I take it as a mild compliment. However, once one focuses on the detail, it becomes a serious issue. Part of the clause is simply verbiage to decorate an otherwise unpleasant and uneasy change.
I referred to the famous amendment No. 244 earlier. Under subsection (5)(a), the complexity and length of a trial is attributable
''to the fact that the issues likely to be material to the verdict of a jury hearing the trial relate to arrangements, transactions or records of a financial or commercial nature or which relate to property''.
If in a health and safety case a victim has died falling down steps or been crushed by a machine, would it not fall squarely under subsection (5)(a)? Arguably, all sorts of other criminal cases might do so, too. Do we really want that definition, or should it relate to commercial transactions affecting property? Amendment No. 243 would leave out the word ''commercial'', so will the Minister explain what it means in this context?
Amendment No. 274, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Hertsmere, would leave out the word ''complexity'', so subsection (6) would refer to reducing only the length of the trial. That takes us back to the question of the true motive.
Amendment No. 246 would remove subsection (7), which deals with disadvantaging the prosecution. My experience of fraud trials is not enormous, but I have done some. I remember an 18-count trial in Norfolk, in which I represented a solicitor accused of mortgage fraud. We got the indictment severed in three, and the judge said that an 18-count indictment was ludicrous, not because of the comprehensibility to the jury, but because of what the prosecution wanted to show. The judge did not aver it in open court, but subsequently took the view that if the defendant was convicted on one indictment, it would be difficult to resist
conviction on the others, and that if he was acquitted on one, the prosecution might want to consider the matter further. In fact, he was acquitted on the first and second indictment, and the prosecution then dropped the third, greatly to the saving of the public purse.
I am all in favour of the severance of indictments, although I remember the prosecutor being upset about it because the massive product that he was going to present had to be compartmentalised. In fact, it did him a good turn. He had lost sight of the wood for the trees and, in this case, of the fact that most of the witnesses were in league with the defendant in the mortgage fraud. There had been no fraud, because they had never been misled. They were the building society managers who had been lending the money on the defendant's say so.
I point that out because it is my experience that large trials are far from an advantage to the prosecution. Distilling issues into small compartments is enormously helpful to everyone, including the prosecution. However, I agree with amendment No. 208, because if the change is not to be to the disadvantage of the prosecution, it should not be to the disadvantage of the defence either.
Amendment No. 254, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Woking will speak, concerns the 12-month rule for a trial. How long is a long trial? We have to grasp that nettle and decide how to define it. Otherwise, I fear that there will be many problems.
I apologise for taking up too much of the Committee's time, but I have identified important points on which I want the Minister's answers. It would be easy to be carried away with the flow of rhetoric that appears in clause 37, but it masks the Government's real intention. They believe that lengthy trials are a bore for the prosecutor and the judicial system and would much rather have them tried by judges, although there is no reason from the point of view of fairness why juries should not be involved.