Clause 81 - ''Bad character''
Criminal Justice Bill
10:45 am
Mr Hilary Benn (Parliamentary Under-Secretary, Home Office; Leeds Central, Labour)
There may be circumstances in which those provisions could be included. Again, they would be subject to the tests that we shall debate on clause 84.
Many amendments have been tabled, although not all are likely to be insisted on. The purpose of all the amendments is to restrict the admissibility of bad character evidence in certain ways. As has already been acknowledged, they fail to achieve that purpose. I recognise that they are, in part, probing amendments, because clause 81 must be read in conjunction with clause 82, which abolishes all the common-law rules that relate to bad character evidence. That means that all evidence of previous misconduct, or propensity other than that covered by the definition, will be generally admissible, subject to the requirement for bare relevance.
The Law Commission pointed out that it is necessary for the definition to go wider than previous convictions, as a range of other potentially prejudicial character evidence might be relevant to a case, but, in light of its potential effect, that character evidence
should fall within the rules for admissibility rather than be generally admissible. We agree. The amendments would not only offer defendants inadequate safeguards but would be regrettable for witnesses. They would enable attacks to be made on non-defendants, based on the excluded evidence of bad character, outside the terms of clause 83. That would significantly restrict the new protection that the clause would extend to witnesses.
Amendments Nos. 361 to 363 would exclude all evidence other than that of previous convictions. As my hon. Friend the Member for Wellingborough said, that would be far more restrictive than the current law.