Fraud (Trials without a Jury) Bill

This is my last attempt in what has been a long process to tempt the Government to take an alternative course of action in the Bill. New clause 15 is drafted simply, and it provides a mechanism so that the prosecution can apply for trials to take place without a jury. The Solicitor-General will know that since the matter first arose in 2003 I have suggested that the Government consider the alternative of special juries if they were worried that the burden would be too great for people summoned off the street to serve on a jury panel and if they feared that those jurors would not be able to cope with a lengthy trial. I suggested that a panel might be set up, drawn from organisations such as the Institute of Chartered Accountants, the Society of Actuaries and other persons who clearly had a knowledge of financial documents. The panel could be called upon to form special juries when they were necessary in long and complex fraud cases. The scheme would have the added advantage that those who served on such a panel might well have taken early retirement, would have the sagacity, wisdom and time to do the work, and would be willing to do it. The task would be a public service that offered them fulfilment and interest. I never succeeded in selling the idea to the Attorney-General or the Solicitor-General, which I regret. The problem that I face with the Bill as it stands is that the title states in rather redolent terms and, I am sure, quite deliberately, ““Fraud (Trials without a Jury) Bill””, with the consequence that any attempt to introduce in the Bill a special jury is immediately met with the argument that it is out of order because on Second Reading we decided not to have juries.