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Mr. Luff: My right hon. Friend may be right, although I do not have quite the antipathy towards legislation that he has.
Mr. Luff: That is probably true. His antipathy comes from deeply held principles, which Labour Members may not understand. Those of us who have had the pleasure of sharing the Tea Room with him, will know how deep seated is his opposition to legislation. I do not have that opposition to legislation, but a Bill such as this deserves close scrutiny.
In the previous Parliament--for reasons that I perhaps should not discuss--I was invited to reflect at length in Committee on a one-clause Bill. It was a harmless, one-clause Bill, and the Clerks had suggested that no amendment was possible to it. I spent some time studying the Bill and developed a series of amendments, as a result of which the Minister clarified the law in a number of important areas. The lawyers and interest groups that I had consulted expressed their deep gratitude to me for clarifying the law. Even the most harmless and innocuous
Bill always gains from proper scrutiny. The House should be nervous of even the best-intentioned Bill being enacted without scrutiny.
Mr. Maclean:
Is not another obligation placed on us this morning? We are to pass a Bill that nearly everyone says deals with one specific case--although, theoretically, there could be more. In such cases, we must be careful that we are getting the measure right.
Mr. Luff:
Obviously, my right hon. Friend can read my mind. The very next point that I intended to make was that, as I read the Bill's proceedings in another place and the background information, one phrase kept recurring in my mind--hard cases make bad law. That is one of oldest saws in considering legislation.
I have no doubt that the case of Mr. Iain Hay Gordon is a desperately hard case, but this House must not rush--in a fit of perfectly understandable moral eagerness--to put right that case without being sure that we are not doing other injustices in the process. We must be clear about the implications for the bodies affected by the Bill. The Criminal Cases Review Commission lies at the heart of the debate.
Mr. Garnier:
My hon. Friend said that we must be careful that the Bill does not produce an injustice in another case. What sort of injustice does he envisage?
Mr. Luff:
My hon. and learned Friend invites me to anticipate remarks that I want to make later. In essence, I am asking whether the case that we are discussing is the only one. We have had assurances that it is. How many cases like it might there be in the system?
Mr. Forth:
I am certain that I heard the hon. Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Mullin) say that he thought there might be a few more cases. That is an important point for us all to bear in mind. I agree that if we were dealing with only one case, it would be worrying. There may be more cases, and that leads to the concern about the effect that the Bill might have on other cases--even though we do not know what they are. I hope that that is helpful to my hon. Friend.
Mr. Luff:
It is genuinely helpful and that is an extremely important point. Exactly how many cases will be caught by the Bill? That is the injustice that I fear. Understandably, the hon. Member for Sunderland, South expressed the hope that the Criminal Cases Review Commission would give the case priority once the Bill had been enacted. However, the work load of the commission is increasing rapidly and to give this case priority over others--whose merit we simply cannot know--is a matter of concern to me. We are imposing a potentially heavy burden on the commission.
Mr. Mullin:
No one is trying to impose a heavy burden on the Criminal Cases Review Commission. The commission wants the power to be able to deal with the matter and will decide the priority to be given to the case--not us. It will still be up to the commission. All that we can do is urge the commission to get on with it, on the grounds that the case has been around for 46 years.
Mr. Luff:
The hon. Gentleman is right and I have no wish to argue on that point. The House has had his
Mr. Deputy Speaker:
Order. I remind the hon. Gentleman that we are on Third Reading and we should be discussing what is in the Bill. Perhaps these remarks should have been made in Committee or on Second Reading.
Mr. Luff:
With the greatest of respect, Mr. Deputy Speaker, there was no Second Reading and no Committee. That is precisely the problem and that is why we must look at the Bill in a little more detail on Third Reading than would normally be the case.
Mr. Deputy Speaker:
Order. I understand the hon. Gentleman's point that there was no Committee, but that is no fault of mine. I am guided by the rules of the House, which are clear. Third Reading is a narrow debate, based on what is in the Bill. What might crop up as a result of the Bill is another matter.
Mr. Forth:
On a point of order, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Without wishing to challenge your ruling, you have the discretion to bear in mind that, through an act of good will, the House has rushed the Bill on its way to this stage. However, this is the only opportunity that the House has had to consider the Bill in any detail. Therefore, will you use your discretion and wisdom in allowing more of a debate than might otherwise be the case?
Mr. Deputy Speaker:
I can tell the right hon. Gentleman that I always use my wisdom in matters relating to him. I am not saying that we cannot have a debate--far from it. However, the rules of the House tell me that the debate must be confined to what is in the Bill. If the rules of the House change, I--as the custodian of the rules--will look after them. At the moment, however, we must confine ourselves to the rules of the House.
Mr. Luff:
You are an effective guardian of the rules of the House, Mr. Deputy Speaker. Perhaps I have been too generous in giving way to colleagues, which has led me down some alleys of which you may not approve. I will now try to return to my notes, which refer directly to what is in the Bill.
The Criminal Cases Review Commission is included in the Bill. Its task is to examine each case impartially and decide whether it would have a real possibility of succeeding if it were given a further hearing in an appeal court. On the basis of what we have heard about the case of Mr. Hay Gordon, there seems to be every chance that it would have a realistic chance of success. I have no doubt that what the hon. Member for Sunderland, South said about the wishes of the commission was accurate.
Helpfully, the Select Committee on Home Affairs--of which the hon. Member for Sunderland, South is the Chairman--has produced a report on the work of the Criminal Cases Review Commission. The report makes a number of recommendations, one of which refers directly to the Bill. As the Chairman of a Select Committee--I see in the Chamber the Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food, whom we seek to hold to account--I know there is always a temptation for a Committee to have it both ways and to wish contradictory things.
To an extent, I see that in the first report of the Select Committee on the work of the Criminal Cases Review Commission, which discusses at length the problems of the commission in prioritising its work and the pressure on its resources. Recommendation 6 states:
The resources available to the CCRC lie at the heart of our consideration today. I freely admit that, until the hon. Member for Sunderland, South intervened, I was not aware that its resources had been increased. It would be extremely helpful to the House in respect of how it should approach its consideration of the Bill if the Minister told us exactly what resources are available to the commission. The notes on clauses--which have been prepared by the Home Office, not by the hon. Gentleman--show how important that consideration is. They tell us:
"We accept and support the basic principle that priority is generally given to applications from those in custody."
The case from which the Bill arises involves a gentleman who is not in custody. Mercifully, if the case has been mishandled, he is at liberty, albeit with the stain on his character described by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Harborough. We have to ask whether it is right to pass the Bill, given the Select Committee's wise view that priority should go to those who are in custody and therefore still suffering the wrong of some miscarriage of justice.
"Expenditure on reviewing such cases would have to be found within the planned funding of the Commission. Any expenditure elsewhere in the criminal justice system resulting from an application to the Commission under the Bill, or from a decision by the Commission to refer a verdict of guilty but insane to the Court of Appeal, would similarly have to be found within current planned provision."
We have to satisfy ourselves that the case in question, which goes back more than 46 years, is a one-off. Typically, the cases that will be brought before the commission will date back over such a period. Re-examining them at such a late stage would be particularly labour intensive. I am always reluctant to reopen cases of such antiquity. After nearly half a century, it is difficult to go through the background and the evidence to understand the circumstances with clarity. It would clearly be a time-consuming business.
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