It is a matter not of the amount of weight that I give to that, but of the Appeal Court's reconsideration in 1989. It placed no reliance on that—certainly not in the terms that the hon. Gentleman suggests.

Since then, we have been asked to consider fresh allegations purporting to cast doubt on the credibility of one of the witnesses, Mr. Ritter, to whom hon. Members have referred. On investigation, those allegations have been found to be largely groundless. Our provisional conclusion is that they provide no reason to think that the Court of Appeal would give Mr. Ritter's evidence any less credence than it did in 1989. As I have said, there was other evidence against Mr. Robinson.

In interviews with the police, Vincent Hickey made detailed admissions—which he later retracted—about his involvement in the burglary at Yew Tree farm. The whole of those interviews were adduced at the 1988–89 appeal hearing. The court was unable to accept the claim that Vincent was or might have been trading false information for immunity from prosecution for another robbery. The Court of Appeal described the evidence against Vincent Hickey as overwhelming. No fresh matters have since been raised that go directly to the evidence against Vincent Hickey.

In 1989, when examining the evidence against Michael Hickey, the Court of Appeal made it clear that it placed no reliance on evidence given at trial by Brian Sinton or Reginald Hickey. Considering the totality of evidence, however, from Michael Lee, Detective Constable Massey, Detective Sergeant Williams, Dennis Eaton, Peter Bryant, prison officer Kelly and Mervyn Ritter, the evidence of association and the evidence of Michael Hickey's access to vehicles of the type observed at the crime scene, the court concluded that the prosecution had proved beyond reasonable doubt that Michael Hickey left the Dog and Partridge public house in company with his cousin Vincent and that thereafter he was at the scene of the burglary of Yew Tree farm. No fresh matters have been raised that go directly to the evidence against Michael Hickey, except for the allegations about Mr. Ritter that I have just dealt with and that hon. Members have referred to.

As has already been said, the fourth defendant, Patrick Molloy, died in prison in 1981 while his application for leave to appeal was pending. His conviction was not referred with the others to the Court of Appeal in 1989 because, at the time, it was thought that the law did not permit an appeal by a deceased person. Since then, in the case of Giuseppe Conlon, it has been established that such an appeal can be heard by means only of a Secretary of State reference.

The evidence against Mr. Molloy at his trial consisted of his admissions at different times to police officers and prison officers. He signed a confession statement, known as exhibit 54. In his proof of evidence, Mr. Molloy recorded not only that he was the author of exhibit 54, but that, in his view, the statements of detective officers Perkins, Leeke, Watson, Wood, Scott and Wys were a correct account of what he had said in interviews with them.

Representations have alleged that Mr. Molloy's admissions while in police custody were made under duress, were fabricated, or both. One of the officers who interviewed Mr. Molloy, the late Detective Constable Perkins, was disciplined for his part in falsifying evidence in a later case. Language analysts have expressed doubts about whether Molloy's reported admissions were in his own words. There are allegations that Mr. Molloy was assaulted and that records of interviews with him were not disclosed to the defence.

In recent years, in a number of appeals and references to the Court of Appeal, alleged malpractice by police officers has been the main issue. Some of those appeals and references have resulted in convictions being quashed. Mindful of that background, we have examined with particular care the fresh representations made in relation to Mr. Molloy's treatment by police officers and his admissions to them. The inquiries made on our behalf in relation to those points have been exceptionally thorough and detailed. In our provisional conclusions, we have sought to explain as fully and clearly as possible what those inquiries have revealed and how they have been taken into account.

The fact that one officer, the late Detective Constable Perkins, was disciplined for falsifying evidence in another case cannot be a ground for referring this case to the Court of Appeal. There would have to be other evidence that, on its own or taken with the evidence of Detective Constable Perkins' later misconduct, casts doubt on the safety of the conviction. We have considered carefully the allegations of ill treatment, but we have found little evidence to support them. The allegation that Mr. Molloy had his teeth broken—to which the hon. Member for Birmingham, Selly Oak (Dr. Jones) referred—is not borne out by prison medical records and is directly contradicted by a photograph of Mr. Molloy taken on 18 December 1978, eight days after he signed his confession statement, which shows him smiling with his teeth intact. That was discovered during the recent thorough investigation in 1993–95. Our provisional conclusion is that there is no basis in those allegations for referring the case to the Court of Appeal.

The opinions of the language analysts were considered during the previous review of the case by my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Rushcliffe (Mr. Clarke). Substantial doubts exist about the methodology and overall validity of some of those analyses, and some of the opinions submitted were based on a misconception of the way in which interviews and statements were noted and written up. The suggestion that Mr. Molloy could not have said certain things attributed to him is directly contradicted by what he said about the making of exhibit 54 and the accuracy of the statements in his proof of evidence. None the less, the further submission delivered to us two days ago asks us to reconsider matters relating to Mr. Molloy's confession statement and the interviews immediately leading to that statement. We will reconsider those matters with the utmost care.

It is alleged that there was a failure to disclose records of interviews with Mr. Molloy because, at times, the custody record of his detention refers to visits by police officers for which there is no corresponding statement. No undisclosed interview records have been found, however, and there is nothing in any other evidence—for example, in Mr. Molloy's discussions with his solicitor—to suggest that any such interviews took place.

The inquiries made on our behalf have sought to establish, as fully as possible, bearing in mind the passage of 17 years, what actually happened. The picture that emerges is of a provincial police station unused to the level of activity associated with a murder inquiry, in which the accuracy of records suffered. The term "interview" was very likely applied generically to any contact between an officer and a prisoner—as the natural meaning of the word permits—and there is no reason to suppose that, on every occasion, questioning took place that should have been recorded. If there were any evidence of undisclosed interviews, that would require grave consideration, but I repeat that there is no such evidence and it is our provisional conclusion that nothing in that aspect of the representations would justify a reference to the Court of Appeal.

The evidence in Mr. Molloy's case as a whole contains, on the one hand, the allegations about ill treatment, fabrication and undisclosed statements, none of which appears to be supported. On the other hand, there is the confession which was signed by Mr. Molloy; his confirmation to his solicitor that the statements by police officers were accurate about what he had said to them; his subsequent spontaneous admissions to other police officers and prison officers; and the evidence of Helen Johnston, who overheard Mr. Molloy say to Mr. Robinson: whatever you do, whatever you say, say the gun went off accidentally". In addition, the recent inquiries have led to a number of other witnesses coming forward with evidence of admissions that Mr. Molloy continued to make about his part in the raid on Yew Tree farm right up to the day before his death two and a half years after he was charged. We have approached such evidence with caution, discounting some which lacks credibility but taking due account, along with all the other evidence, of those statements that do have credibility. Our provisional conclusion has been made clear. Other matters have been raised with us—