APPENDIX 3
Letter from Martin Bowley QC
Your letter to the Bar Council dated 12 February
2003 has been passed to me. I should emphasise that I write in
a personal capacity. I am President of the Bar Lesbian and Gay
Group (B.L.A.G.G.) and I was a member of the Home Office Sex Offences
Review. I was also a member of the C.P.S. Working Party, which
prepared the C.P.S. Policy for Preventing Crime with a Homophobic
Element which was published last November.
My concern, which I hope falls within your Committee's
terms of reference, relates to the anonymity of L.G.B. witnesses
in sexual cases and the anonymity of L.G.B. witnesses and complainants
in homophobic hate crime offences. The problem is set out at pages
11 and 12 of the policy statement. I attach copies. [1]The
situation which concerns me—and I do not believe it is unusual—is
the position of a gay or bisexual man, perhaps in his late twenties,
a primary school teacher, married with children, who witnesses
or is a victim of a sexual or queer bashing attack, inside or
outside a well known gay club or venue. Is he going to report—let
alone appear as a witness—of such an incident if the inevitable
prurient publicity could put at risk his marriage, his job, even
his contact with his children? Statistics are already available
(in "Breaking the Chains of Hate" published in 1999
by the National Advisory Group/Policing Lesbian and Gay Communities)
that only 18% of homophobic incidents are reported to the police.
I hope that that figure alone will be a matter of great concern
to your Committee. I would be happy to enlarge on these problems
to your Committee if they would find it valuable.
March 2003
1 Not printed. Back
|
