---

Fraud (Trials without a Jury) Bill

My Lords, my admiration for the judgment of the noble Baroness remains at a high level. If she will permit me, I draw attention to it because this is not a matter for lawyers, but for the public. That is why the second point made by the noble Baroness is so pertinent. She said—and I believe her to be absolutely right—that the public in this country are utterly disconcerted when they see serious crime not being dealt with and serious cases collapsing. The noble Baroness, Lady Mallalieu, may be right to say that in many parts of the world our justice system is admired. I wish that was true in all the cities in this country; it certainly is not. This is something we must look at very hard. What arguments have been advanced the other way? The principal argument is that this is a generalised attack on the jury system. It is not. It is limited to a small category of cases. It is not the first time that Parliament has agreed that there are exceptional cases where jury trial should not be applied. This House agreed this in 2003 in relation to Section 44 of the Criminal Justice Act 2003, with regard to jury intimidation. It accepted it in the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Act 2004, which, contrary to the knowledge of the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, is in force. In 1988—forgive me for mentioning it—the government of the party opposite declassified or reclassified a number of offences so that they ceased to be offences capable of being tried by jury and became summary offences. Several noble Lords who have spoken were Ministers in that Government. From time to time it is appropriate to look at the merits of the argument and see whether that is right. As I said when I opened this debate, I fully recognise the huge advantages of jury trial, many of which have been referred to, but there are some exceptional cases in which the disadvantages outweigh those advantages. What was the second argument put forward? There was the perhaps slightly curious argument that if it was justified to have a non-jury trial for serious, complex and long fraud cases, what about other complex and long cases? I do not think that those who made that point were inviting me to amend the Bill to extend it. That is the one thing that I do not want to do. But there is a difference, which has been referred to in this House before—the noble Lord, Lord Marsh, drew attention to it in an earlier debate, and I am sorry that he is not in his place. There are serious and long trials in which the subject matter is well within the understanding and experience of those who hear it; but when you get into areas of great complexity about financial instruments, capital markets, split capital trusts and so forth, it becomes much more difficult for any of us to be able to judge those against the experiences that we have. If it is a case in which the question is—and this was a point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Brennan, who is I think not in his place—