Part of Orders of the Day — Crime and Punishment (Scotland) Bill – in the House of Commons at 8:30 pm on 20 January 1997.
Lord James Douglas-Hamilton
, Edinburgh West
8:30,
20 January 1997
I would not describe the measure as an inducement to plead guilty. I believe that it could be taken into account as a mitigating factor-which is rather different-if the accused faced up to his responsibility and, instead of making false accusations against a victim, did not put her through that trauma. A court should be entitled to take that into account. As I said, section 196 of the 1995 Act makes it clear that the court is able to take into account a plea of guilty in determining the appropriate sentence. After all, if a person who has committed a very serious crime tells a pack of lies, that is a different situation from that of a person who admits his transgressions and shows some contrition.
Amendment agreed to.
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