Fraud (Trials without a Jury) Bill

I would prefer not to put in the Bill a restriction on the discretion of the president of the Queen’s bench division, the head of criminal justice. However, he will be able to look at Hansard and read the arguments advanced by my hon. and learned Friend and me, and we should leave it to him to determine which judge should handle any given case. In some circumstances, he may decide that the judge who heard the initial section 43 application is not the right one to deal with the trial as a whole. It is, however, the case that the way in which the whole process will evolve is one in which hon. Members would prefer the same judge to deal with the case, where that is possible and practicable. That is as far as I want to go. I would rather leave the discretion in the hands of the head of criminal justice. I cannot give an undertaking in relation to any amendment from the Lords. A number of circuit judges are amply qualified to handle these cases. People like Sir Geoffrey Rivlin and others spring to mind. They could deal with the serious cases if they were disposed to do so. It is not intended that any old circuit judge, to put it carefully, should deal with them. The head of criminal justice will take a view on who would be the appropriate judge to deal with these issues and will ensure that the appropriate judge can handle the array of evidence put before him. Many judges in their careers as barristers will have handled masses of complex material and had to form an opinion on it. I do not see the difficulty with that. The point made by the hon. Member for Somerton and Frome (Mr. Heath) completely defeated me. He seemed to suggest that circuit judges ought to be on their circuit and that we could not spare them to deal with complex, serious, fraud cases which took too long, so we had to use High Court judges, who are more senior judges and often deal with more serious cases. That argument does not stack up. We need to ensure that we have the right judge for the right case. We can do that with the Government amendments, and I hope that the House will support them. I have not dealt with a point raised by my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Medway. Does he wish me to deal with public interest immunity, or is he satisfied at this point?