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Session 2008 - 09 Publications on the internet General Committee Debates Coroners and Justice Bill |
The Committee consisted of the following Members:Alan Sandall, Committee
Clerk attended the
Committee Public Bill CommitteeThursday 5 March 2009(Morning)[Frank Cook in the Chair]Coroners and Justice BillWritten evidence to be reported to the HouseCJ
26 Caroline
Beasley-Murray CJ
27 Information
Commissioner CJ
27a Information Commissioner
(additional) 9
am
That
the Order of the Committee of 3 February be amended as
follows: (1)
in paragraph (1) of the Order of the Committee of 3
February, there shall be inserted at the
end (h)
at 10.30 am and 4.00 pm on Tuesday 10
March;; (2)
in paragraph (4) of that Order, for 4.00 pm on Thursday
5 March there shall be substituted 10.00 pm
on Tuesday 10
March. Following
discussions through the usual channels with my hon. Friend the Member
for Wrexham and the hon. Member for Rugby and Kenilworth, the House has
agreed to extend the Committee stage of the Bill by a day on Tuesday 10
March. The motion makes the necessary consequential change to the
programme order adopted by the Committee at its first sitting. Next
Tuesday, we shall sit until 10 pm, and I am convinced that that
additional time will be enough to complete the scrutiny of the
Bill. Question
put and agreed
to.
Clause 61Investigation
anonymity
orders Mr.
Edward Garnier (Harborough) (Con): I beg to move amendment
78, in clause 61, page 35, line 14, leave out justice of the
peace and insert Crown Court
judge.
The
Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss the
following: amendment 80, in clause 62, page 36, line 31, leave
out justice of the peace and insert Crown Court
judge. Amendment
81, in clause 62, page 37, line 9, leave out justice
and insert
judge. Amendment
130, in clause 62, page 37, line 11, leave out justice of the
peace and insert Crown Court
judge. Amendment
131, in clause 62, page 37, line 12, leave out justice of the
peace and insert Crown Court judge.
Amendment 132,
in clause 62, page 37, line 14, leave out justice and
insert
judge. Amendment
133, in clause 62, page 37, line 16, leave out justice of the
peace and insert Crown Court
judge. Amendment
134, in clause 62, page 37, line 17, leave out from to
to end of line 18 and insert such person as
the Secretary of State may by order prescribe in respect of the
relevant county
court. Amendment
135, in clause 63, page 37, line 26, leave out justice of the
peace and insert Crown Court
judge. Amendment
136, in clause 63, page 38, line 10, leave out justice
and insert
judge. Amendment
137, in clause 64, page 38, line 19, leave out justice of the
peace and insert Crown Court
judge. Amendment
84, in clause 64, page 38, line 20, leave out Crown and
insert
High. Amendment
138, in clause 64, page 38, line 25, leave out justice
and insert Crown Court
judge. Amendment
139, in clause 64, page 38, line 27, leave out justice of the
peace and insert Crown Court
judge. Amendment
140, in
clause 65, page 38, line 34, leave
out justice of the peace and insert Crown Court
judge. Amendment
141, in
clause 65, page 38, line 35, leave
out justice and insert
judge. Amendment
142, in
clause 65, page 38, line 36, leave
out justice and insert
judge. Amendment
85, in
clause 65, page 39, line 5, leave
out Crown and insert
High. Amendment
143, in
clause 65, page 39, line 5, leave
out justices decision and insert
decision of the Crown Court
judge. Amendment
144, in
clause 65, page 39, line 7, leave
out justice of the peace and insert Crown Court
judge. Amendment
145, in
clause 68, page 40, line 15, leave
out paragraph
(a). Amendment
146, in
clause 68, page 40, line 20, at
end insert (d) the
reference to the High Court is to be read as a reference to the High
Court of Northern Ireland; (e)
the reference to a judge of the High Court is to be read as a reference
to a judge of the High Court of Northern
Ireland.. Amendment
191, in
clause 69, page 40, line 25, after
second a, insert
Crown. Amendment
192, in
clause 69, page 40, line 27, after
first the, insert
Crown. Amendment
193, in
clause 69, page 41, line 1, after
the, insert
Crown. Amendment
195, in
clause 70, page 41, line 11, at
end insert (A1) For the
avoidance of doubt, whilst applications for a witness anonymity order
must be made to the Crown court such orders may govern current,
adjourned or future proceedings in the magistrates
courts.. Amendment
194, in
clause 70, page 41, line 13, after
the, insert Crown.
Amendment 201,
in
clause 80, page 45, line 35, after
Appeal, insert except where
the Crown court is specified as the appropriate
court,.
Mr.
Garnier: Amendment 78 stands in my name and those of my
hon. Friends. I think that on this occasion my hon. Friend the Member
for North Wiltshire intends to leave his name on the
amendment. Mr.
James Gray (North Wiltshire) (Con): I reconfirm that I
will, of course, support all the amendments that my hon. and learned
Friend proposes from now onwards. I am delighted to say that, with one
exception, I have supported the Conservative Whip throughout my
12 years in this place, and I intend to do so for the next
12 years, too. I am glad that when I divided the Committee last week,
both my hon. Friend the Member for North-West Norfolk and the Whip
joined me in my
Division.
Mr.
Tim Boswell (Daventry) (Con): As we seem to be in the
business of making confessions, the Committee will have noticed that my
name is absent from the amendment. I give my hon. and learned Friend
notice that I have, as the Scots would say, some doots
about the matter, because I am a doughty supporter of the interests and
the importance of magistrates, including the lay magistracy, but I have
some confidence that I shall be persuaded by his
eloquence.
The
Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice (Maria
Eagle): Especially sitting behind
you.
Mr.
Garnier: Exactly. I look forward to enjoying the support
of my consistent but for one occasion hon. Friend the Member for North
Wiltshire and my hon. Friend the Member for Daventry, who has what he
called doots. We shall see what we can do about
that. This
is quite a simple set of amendments. What I seek to do flows from the
evidence that came out of the evidence sessions. I think that it was
Mr. Keir Starmer, the Director of Public Prosecutions, who
informed us that of the cases that had gone to the courts under the
witness anonymity legislation passed in the summer, only three cases
had gone before a magistrate, and that was a district judge rather than
a lay magistrates bench. I appreciate that we are talking about
investigation anonymity orders, but it strikes me that if the practice
is that most applications for witness anonymity orders have gone to
Crown court judges, the orders under clause 61 are also likely, on the
great preponderance of occasions, to go before a Crown court judge.
That will not necessarily be the case, but it is a fair
guess. It
may be suggested that because these orders are made in the course of
the investigatory stage, it is not possible to know whether the
investigations will lead to a charge at all and, if they do lead to a
charge, whether that charge will be dealt with most suitably before a
magistrates court or a Crown court, but in any event, given the
delicate nature of the jurisdiction
Alun
Michael (Cardiff, South and Penarth) (Lab/Co-op): On a
point of order, Mr. Cook. Members of the public cannot
attend our sitting. It seems that the door to the room has been left
locked for some
reason.
The
Chairman: Well, we must grateful for the fact that some
members of the Committee consider themselves to be
doorkeepers.
Given
the delicate nature of the jurisdiction that we are creating, it is
probably more sensible for the applications to be made to the Crown
court rather than a magistrate. I, of course, accept that it is
difficult to appreciate with certainty at the time of an investigation
and when the police or the authorities are considering whether to make
an application for an investigation anonymity order whether that
investigation will lead to a charge and, if there were a charge,
whether it will lead to proceedings in a Crown court or a magistrates
court. In any event, I want to know whether the Government are
convinced and think it wholly appropriate in all circumstances that
such applications should be made to a magistrates court as opposed to a
Crown court.
David
Howarth (Cambridge) (LD): Like the hon. Member for
Daventry, I have doubts about the proposal, but I wish first to declare
an interest in so far as my wife is a magistrate. I have high regard
for the work of magistrates in similar areas, such as the granting of
search warrants. They undertake sensitive work and do so very
well. The
downside of the orders is the number of people who get to know about
the identity of the person whose identity the orders are intended to
protect. How many more people will know the identity compared with the
current position, when the police assure the potential witness that
they will not let their name out? A formal process seems to carry with
it the risk that more people will know identities rather than only the
police officers conducting the investigation. The amendment tabled by
the hon. and learned Member for Harborough raises the problem whether
more people would get to know if the order were made by the Crown court
than by the magistrates court. I fear that, given the formality
surrounding Crown courts, that more extraneous people would be in the
know, if the proposal were
adopted.
Maria
Eagle: The amendments all concentrate on restricting the
making of an investigation anonymity order through a Crown court judge
rather than a justice of the peace or a district judge at a magistrates
court in Northern Ireland. As has been anticipated by the hon. and
learned Gentleman and the hon. Member for Cambridge, the provision is
designed as a tool for the police when investigating gang-related,
gun-and-knife homicides, so the point at which an order would be made
would be earlier than in respect of witness anonymity orders, which are
designed to deal with trial situations.
The reason given by the hon. and learned Gentlemen for tabling the
amendmentsthe related statsis not as compelling as we
might think, simply because of the earlier stage. Indeed, he
anticipated that that would be one my
arguments.
We believe
that the amendments are unnecessary because, in many ways, JPs are
generally more experienced in dealing with matters relating to police
investigations; and the hon. Member for Cambridge has said that arrest
and search warrants are often issued by JPs, as well as warrants for
further detention in police custody. Indeed, early orders in respect of
investigations are already part of the magistrates
experience.
We believe
that it is undesirable to limit those powers to Crown court judges. The
idea is to provide a speedy local service to assist the police in
providing reassurance to witnesses who might otherwise not come forward
with evidence at the very beginning of an investigation, which is often
the most crucial time for ensuring that homicide cases can be solved.
We believe that no issues of liberty arise at that early stage. It is
about offering the reassurance that identities will be kept secret;
there is no prospect of criminal proceedings being instituted as a
result. We therefore believe that it would be wrong to exclude JPs and
magistrates, because we have every confidence that they are perfectly
capable, and perhaps more experienced, when dealing with such
issues.
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©Parliamentary copyright 2009 | Prepared 6 March 2009 |