Fraud (Trials without a Jury) Bill

As the hon. Gentleman knows very well, he has misinterpreted what I have just said. We were talking about the safety of the verdict and the verdict would be, no doubt, safe whether it was decided by a jury or a judge. The problem or mischief that we are addressing is how, over a considerable time, the process in serious and complex fraud trials has resulted in the courts and the prosecution, in particular, having to adopt a number of stratagems that have meant that the full culpability of the crime committed by particular individuals has not been exposed in court. That has been done by reducing the number of counts on the indictment so that all the counts that could have been put are not put, by dropping some of the less serious defendants out of the indictment so they never get punished, and by severing indictments so that we get two trials rather than one.