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Prevention of Delay in Trials

This is the text of the Prevention of Delay in Trials Bill, as presented to the House of Commons on 28 October 1997.

 
 
  
Prevention of Delay in Trials
 
 
 
 
ARRANGEMENT OF CLAUSES
Clause 
1.Amendment of the Prosecution of Offences Act 1985.
2.Amendment of the Prosecution of Offences (Custody Time Limits) Regulations 1987.
3.Short title, commencement and extent.
 

 

 
 
A

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Provide that a person indicted for a serious criminal offence shall be brought to trial within a period of 110 days; and for connected purposes.

BE IT ENACTED by the Queen's most Excellent Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and Commons, in this present Parliament assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:-
 

Amendment of the Prosecution of Offences Act 1985.     1. - (1) Section 22 (power of Secretary of State to set time limits in relation to preliminary stages of criminal proceedings) of the Prosecution of Offences Act 1985 is amended as follows.
 
      (2) For subsection (3)(a) there is substituted-
 
 
    "(a) in the case of the Crown Court, that there are exceptional circumstances which fully justify doing so; or
 
    (b) in the case of any other court, that there is good and sufficient cause for doing so; and"
      (3) In subsection (3), for "(b)" there is substituted "(c)".
 
Amendment of the Prosecution of Offences (Custody Time Limits) Regulations 1987.     2. - (1) In Regulation 5 of the Prosecution of Offences (Custody of Time Limits) Regulations 1987 as amended, for "112", wherever it occurs, there is substituted "110".
 
      (2) In paragraph (2) of Regulation 7 of the Regulations, for the words "paragraphs (3) and (4)" there is substituted the words "paragraph (3)".
 
      (3) Paragraph (4) of Regulation 7 of the Regulations is omitted.
 
Short title, commencement and extent.     3. - (1) This Act may be cited as the Prevention of Delay in Trials Act 1998.
 
      (2) The provisions of this Act shall come into force on the expiry of a period of three months from the date on which it is passed.
 
      (3) This Act extends to England and Wales only.
 
 

 
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