Fraud (Trials without a Jury) Bill

My Lords, I apologise to the noble Lord. He is in the place normally occupied by the noble Lord, Lord Stoddart, which has become known as ““this corner”” in this House. I apologise for not having spotted him. If you can point to the people in the dock and say, ““The money was once over there, but now it is in their pockets””, I do not think that juries have much difficulty in seeing the dishonesty. Other cases are much more complex and difficult and problems and difficulties arise. I cannot remember which noble Lord asked this question, but we are certainly not saying that all cases that involve fraud fit within these procedures; absolutely not. That takes me to a point that singularly, with respect, was not referred to by those noble Lords who responded to this Bill—that is, the terms of the Criminal Justice Act that require a decision on whether the interests of justice require that a case should be tried by a judge alone. The third point that was raised was that there are other measures that ought to deal with the problems that we have identified. I make it clear and have made it clear that I welcome those other measures and welcome the support expressed today for some additional measures, such as plea bargaining. I am not sure about press conferences by juries, but no doubt we shall hear the noble Lord, Lord Thomas, further on that at a later stage. Some of those measures are very valuable, but the question is whether they would solve all the problem cases. I have two responses. First, I do not believe from the empirical evidence that they will. Secondly, to the extent that we have improvements in trial process, those are all matters that can be taken into account by the judge and the Lord Chief Justice who makes the decision whether the mode of trial should be by judge alone or by judge and jury. So there is a built-in mechanism in the Bill to enable those measures to have effect—and, if they do, no doubt a judge will say in the light of looking at a particular case that the interests of justice do not require that it should be dealt with by a judge alone, because it is possible to deal with it in this or that way. That takes me on to an important point. Case management largely works one way. A judge can tell the prosecution, ““You’re not bringing that evidence, that charge or those defendants””. A judge cannot say to a defendant, ““You’re not running this or that defence””. So the way in which you cut cases down—and this is the fundamental point about bringing the full criminality—is by requiring a prosecution to cut down its case. I do not deny that; indeed, I encourage the prosecutors to look hard at cases to cut them down when appropriate. I go back to the passage that I quoted in opening from the noble and learned Lord, Lord Phillips of Worth Matravers, the Lord Chief Justice—and I do not understand him to take a different view about this matter, despite the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew—that justice is flawed if the nature of the tribunal’s process means that cogent evidence cannot be put before it. There are examples where cases have not proceeded as a result of that. In the Maxwell trial, the trial judge said: "““The prosecution and most of the defence are agreed that, were it practicable, all the counts should be the subject matter of a single trial. All are agreed that the length and complexity of such a trial would far outstrip the capacity of any jury””." It was not dealt with in a single trial and, after the first trial came to an end, the second trial was stayed on the grounds that it would be an abuse of process to continue. I do not say that juries cannot understand. What I said very clearly in opening was that for juries to understand you have to cut the case down, and it is in cutting the case down that in some cases means that the case is not presented as it ought to be.