Fraud (Trials without a Jury) Bill

My Lords, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Lyell, seemed to be saying that we are improving our track record at dealing with fraud and fraud trials. As I see something like £16 billion a year being extracted by fraud, which is approximately£650 per household in the UK per annum, I am increasingly angered at this situation—the low rate of prosecution, the relatively lenient sentencing of fraud and the increasing exploitation of fraud by organised crime. Fairly recently the National Criminal Intelligence Service estimated that United Kingdom organised crime gets as much money from fraud as it does from drugs. I am therefore seriously concerned about the problem. However, I do not see anything in the Billto suggest that my noble and learned friend the Attorney-General is engaging in a general, or even significant, attack on jury trials. To hear the rising rhetoric of some speakers in this debate, one would imagine that this is a full-frontal attack on every civil libertythat has existed for the past 700 years. I do not see it that way, nor do I believe that jury trials are a pre-requisite for justice to be dispensed. Day by day across the UK, trials take place in magistrates’ courts without a jury. As the Solicitor-General, Mike O’Brien, said at Second Reading in the House of Commons: "““Every day, in criminal courts across the country, people elect in either-way cases to allow district judges—judges sitting alone—to decide guilt or innocence in trials ... Someone who gets arrested for benefit fraud and charged with a deception can be tried by a judge sitting alone, so it surely cannot be said that a senior judge sitting alone could not do justice in the case of someone arrested for a serious white collar crime””.—[Official Report, Commons, 26/11/06; col. 1097.]" I listened with interest to the noble Lord, Lord Maclennan, waxing eloquent about our freedoms and liberties, which he equated with jury trials. I do not believe that he enjoys an unfettered right to them north of the Border, but are we going to conclude from that that people north of the Border have lost all their liberties and do not enjoy any of the freedoms we have? Of course we are not. It is a preposterous notion. Anyone can complain about all sorts of things, but nobody can properly complain about the length of the consultation process in relation to trial without juries in cases such as these. If there were to be any complaint, one could say that the consultation process, which has taken place over two decades, has, if anything, been far too lengthy. We heard about Lord Roskill’s fraud trials committee. It recommended that complex trials be held before special fraud tribunals made up of a judge and specially qualified lay people rather than before a jury. I understand that the 1998 consultation paper, Juries in Serious Fraud Trials, elicited a majority response favouring replacing juries in serious and complex fraud trials. We have heard several times that, in 2001, Lord Justice Auld reviewed criminal courts in England and Wales. He reported on the benefits of trial by a single judge and concluded in favour of a tribunal comprised of a judge and people with business and financial experience. The Government held a general consultation on the Auld report. When they published their White Paper, Justice for All, in 2001, they decided in favour of trials by judges alone. In the special circumstances of the very small number of long, complex and serious fraud cases each year, I am persuaded of the merit of trial without a jury. However, I can see merit in a judge being assisted by perhaps two assessors with business and financial experience. If my noble and learned friend the Attorney-General is really set against that, I hope we will hear his arguments in his reply so that we can examine his reasoning fairly closely. The facts are clear. There were some 28,000 contested jury trials in 2005 and about 30,000 last year yet, during the debate in the House of Commons, Mike O’Brien, the Solicitor-General, replied with great clarity to a question from Mr Dominic Grieve about how many cases were affected by the provisions of the Bill. He said: "““our estimate is that the number will be between half a dozen—that is the more likely figure—and 15 to 20 cases””.—[Official Report, Commons, 29/11/07; col. 1090.]." I believe that justice is well served by this modest measure. Considering the size of the problem, it is perhaps too modest. My noble and learned friend quoted what Lord Justice Auld said in his report and that quotation deserves repetition. If I had to pick two of the most compelling factors in favour of reform, I would settle on the burdensome length of trials and the increasing speciality and complexity of the cases with which jurors, who are largely or wholly strangers to the subject matter, are expected to cope. They both put justice at risk. Particularly in the light of last week’s votes in favour of an appointed House, I caution this House against the amendment moved by the Opposition. For an appointed House that claims to recognise the primacy of the House of Commons to deny the Bill a Second Reading is to play with fire. The Criminal Justice Act 2003 has been passed. Section 43 of that Act, which requires an affirmative resolution, allows serious and complex fraud cases to be tried without a jury in closely defined circumstances. If this Bill were enacted in response to demands from the Opposition, the Government could implement Section 43, as amended, without the need for further parliamentary proceedings. The Bill received a Second Reading in the Commons by a substantial majority. On Report, the Government secured substantial majorities. The Bill was read a third time. To defy the Commons by denying the Bill a Second Reading and a Committee in which amendments can be discussed is dangerous in the light of our vote on composition. I remind the House that the report of the Joint Committee on Conventions was approved by both Houses. I shall quote three short sentences from its conclusions: "““We do not recommend any attempt to define a manifesto Bill … We recommend that in future the Convention be described as the Government Bill Convention””—" and, very significantly— "““In addition the evidence points to the emergence in recent years of a practice that the House of Lords will usually give a Second Reading to any government Bill, whether based on the manifesto or not””." This House and the other place approved that report on conventions as the basis of a common understanding about how we go forward in relation to reform of your Lordships’ House. If we were serious in the vote last week, we take the step of voting against a Second Reading at our peril.