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Criminal Justice Bill (4)

01 January 1991

Criminal Justice Bill
artdoc June=1994

The Criminal Justice Bill, published in January, did not at first
incorporate many of the illiberal proposals of the Royal
Commission on Criminal Justice (see Statewatch vol 3 no 4). Its
proposed abolition of the right to silence was the one proposal
not supported by that Commission. But since the Bill was
published, the government has announced that it plans to follow
the Commission's proposal to abolish the committal stage of
criminal cases going to the crown Court (abolishing the automatic
right of pre-trial screening for sufficiency of prosecution
evidence). Further proposed amendments to the Bill include
statutory plea-bargaining, which the Commission supported despite
acknowledging that it will result in more innocent people being
convicted. At the end of February the government announced its
intention to do away with a defendant's right to elect jury trial
for petty theft and other minor offences (one of the Commission's
most unpopular proposals), and in the pipeline are measures to
force advance disclosure of the defence case. It is becoming
increasingly clear that the government intends to legislate to
bring into force all the harsh measures recommended by the
Commission, while ignoring the Commission's (admittedly
inadequate) counter-weight measures to protect criminal suspects
and defendants.
Guardian 8.2.94; Independent 11, 23.2.94.

Statewatch Vol 4 no 2, March-April 1994