First Schedule.—(SUPPLEMENTARY PROVISIONS AS TO PROCEDURE, APPEALS, ETC.) (Hansard, 29 January 1957)

§ Mr. Anthony Greenwood
I beg to move, in page 8, line 20, to leave out "three" and to insert "twenty-one".
This Amendment relates to the provision in the First Schedule which says that Where a person is convicted of murder, he shall not be sentenced to death because of section six of this Act on the ground that he has already been found guilty of a murder committed in Great Britain on a different occasion unless notice is given to him and to the clerk of assize that it is intended to prove the previous conviction three days before the trial.
It seems to us that three days is much too short notice to give to the prisoner and to his legal advisers, and we therefore suggest, instead, that there should be three weeks' notice so that the necessary steps might be taken. We should very much like to hear from the Attorney-General why the Government felt that three days was adequate notice. If the right hon. and learned Gentleman could give us some reassurance on the point we should be most grateful to him.

§ The Attorney-General
I am very glad that the hon. Member for Rossendale (Mr. Anthony Greenwood) has invited me to explain why we put in, at first sight, a low limit of three days' notice. The Amendment suggests that there should be at least 21 days' notice. I think I shall be able to convince the hon. Gentleman that, in certain circumstances, 21 days' notice might prove extremely inconvenient without having any corresponding advantages.
962 Clause 6 will apply to two categories of cases. There will be, perhaps, the Smith, Christie and Heath type of cases where, in the course of one assize or one session of the Central Criminal Court, more than one charge of murder will be preferred against the same individual. There, of course, there will be the evidence in the magistrate's court of more than one murder having been committed, and from the time that the case first starts in the magistrate's court—for instance, in the case of Christie—it will be known to the accused long before the trial at the Old Bailey that he certainly may be, and almost certainly will be, charged with two murders. In that type of case, a provision for notice of any kind seems somewhat unnecessary because the accused will know right from the start. He will know certainly from the moment that he obtains, as he can do, a draft of the bill of indictment under the new practice rules which have recently been made, or a copy of the indictment. In that type of case, therefore, the requirement of notice does not really exist. That is why one has the proviso to the end of paragraph 2.
9.15 p.m.
The other category of case to which Clause 6 applies will be the category where a man has been sentenced to life imprisonment for one murder and then, after his release, commits another murder for which he is indicted. Of course, it will be well known to him that he has previously been convicted of murder in cases of that category, and he may suspect and, indeed, apprehend that, on his second trial, he will be charged with having committed the first murder.
I quite agree that there is a need for notice, but it seems extremely unlikely that in that type of case his legal advisers 963 would be unaware of his previous conviction of murder. It is highly improbable. In my experience, prosecutions are never reluctant to inform the defence, on inquiry, of the accused's previous convictions known to them, which the accused may or may not dispute.
It may be asked why we have chosen the low limit of three days. The reason, shortly, is this. We believe that normally—indeed, almost certainly—the accused will know long before three days before his trial commences that he is charged with having committed a previous offence of murder. But if we put in a period of 21 days, it might lead to difficulties in this way. Suppose we had, for instance, an assize at Northampton, with a man charged with two murders; one case is tried at that assize, and the other case, because of lack of time or for other reasons, is adjourned or transferred to the assize at Leicester, the next assize town, which takes place immediately afterwards. If that happened, the proviso to this paragraph would not apply. Then, if we had to give 21 days' notice, we would not be able to try at Leicester Assizes.

§ Mr. S. Silverman
Why need we?

§ The Attorney-General
The hon. Gentleman may say, "Why need we?" but I am not in favour of the idea that where there are two charges of murder, neither of them having been tried, there should be any long interval between the first trial and the second trial. I think that would be very difficult and probably rather intolerable. Trials in those circumstances should follow as speedily as possible one after the other. That is the reason why 21 days as a limit might prove extremely awkward in particular cases.
Let me, however, add this. Suppose the defence were to find that they were in any way embarrassed by the shortness of notice in a particular case—if, for instance they had notice only four days before the trial and the accused said, "I dispute that I was the person convicted of this other murder; I was not there. They have got the wrong person; 964 it was not me." Of course, that is very unlikely in that second category type of case, but let us suppose that he did wish to dispute that. The dispute would probably be only on identity or whether it was a different occasion, which would not be so difficult to resolve if the two occasions were years apart and the man had been serving a life sentence in between. If the defence said they were not ready to deal with it, and were taken by surprise by the charge, I do not believe that there is any judge who would not grant an adjournment at the request of the defence, nor do I suppose for one moment that the prosecution would not be absolutely willing to accede to the request.
In fact, one might say that the provision for three days is really unnecessary because, in practice, the defence, where there is any possibility of a charge of this sort, would be informed of the possibility a long time beforehand. However, I think it is desirable to have a minimum period, and, for the reasons I have given, I believe this to be the right minimum period; but if, in a particular instance, it was too short, there would be no difficulty in the defence getting a longer time in which to consider it.

§ Mr. Anthony Greenwood
I have listened with great sympathy and interest to what the right hon. and learned Attorney-General has told us. The most convincing part of the case he advanced was his reference to the possibility of the defence getting a postponement of the trial on the ground he mentioned. However, in view of the assurance that he has given us upon this point, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the Amendment.