§ A person convicted of murder or of capital murder shall, on proof that new evidence has become available to him which was not reasonably available to him at the time of his trial, tending to establish his innocence of the crime for which he was convicted or that in all the circumstances there is reason to apprehend that a miscarriage of justice may have occurred, be entitled to apply to the Court of Criminal Appeal for an order for a new trial, and if the Court is satisfied that such new evidence might, if placed before the trial jury, have affected their verdict they shall order a new trial of the case.—[Mr. Hale.]
§ Brought up, and read the First time.
§ Mr. HaleI beg to move, That the Clause be read a Second time.
I should like to say to my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) that I am glad to be moving this Motion, because these are matters on which I have spent a very great deal of time, and that these are matters of profound importance. May I explain the new Clause quite briefly? I do not propose to spend any time discussing whether the drafting of the Clause itself meets the need precisely.
I beg of the Joint Under-Secretary not to use any of the time of the Committee by replying that such powers now exist. He knows perfectly well, and I know perfectly well, that although it is technically possible for the Court of Criminal Appeal to extend the time for the hearing of any appeal, although it is possible for the Court of Criminal Appeal to exercise its appellate jurisdiction within the limit permitted for hearing new evidence and so on, in fact it is done only in a very limited class of case laid down by the court, which is well understood, and it is really only in cases where, within the normal time allowed for the appeal, certain new facts have been raised or have come to the notice of the defence, which 888 the defence could show that they could not have ascertained by inquiries at the time of the original inquiry.
What I am suggesting in this new Clause, and what I ask the Committee to consider, is that we should adopt a proposal which has been adopted for centuries in many other countries, and which has worked admirably in many other countries. It is that we should charge the Supreme Court of our normal criminal jurisdiction—we all know that there are technically opportunities for appeal on the law to the House of Lords in criminal cases in certain conditions, but the Court of Appeal is normally the supreme court in criminal jurisdiction—that we should charge that Court with the power, in cases where it appears that a grave miscarriage of justice has occurred, or in cases where it appears that evidence was not brought before the jury which might have been brought before the jury, or where new facts have arisen which throw a new light on the matter, of rehearing or reconsidering the whole matter and making it clear not only that we desire that justice shall be done but that justice shall appear to be done.
I do not often speak dogmatically, but on one or two points here I will speak dogmatically. It is not in the interests of justice to make errors or to conceal errors, and private inquiries ordered by the Home Office, in which distinguished lawyers are empowered to make private investigations and take private testimony, will never satisfy the public conscience. However distinguished, however honourable, however sincerely that investigation is conducted, the public will still say that the man was tried in the light of day, but that the investigation has taken place in the dark, and without the accused being afforded full opportunities for representation.
§ 5.15 p.m.
§ I say it is important that we should acknowledge that. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton (Mr. Paget), in the course of some very interesting observations a day or two ago, referred to the question of certainty, which is an extremely important question. It is a question on which very rarely has much attention been displayed. We rather accept as one of the inevitable traditions of our judicial system that 889 errors rarely occur. We accept that the jury system is the best possible system, and I myself would not like to see it go, but we ought to pay very much more attention to this question of certainty, this question of the degree of proof, of the point at which evidence becomes important or convincing.
§ In most of the cases which have excited the attention of the public—most of the murder cases of the last century—where women have been charged with poisoning their husbands or husbands have been charged with poisoning their wives, the greatest attention has been directed to the question whether a murder has been committed at all. The issue before the jury has rarely been, "Did Mrs. Jones murder Jones?" It has almost always been, "Was Jones murdered?" Really important questions have been answered by decisive witnesses, such as the little man who conies before the court as the scientific expert witness.
§ If we are to consider this possibility of error, I would remind the Committee that my hon. and learned Friend, in the same speech to which I have referred, mentioned the Seddon case. He pointed out, as has also been pointed out by the distinguished editor of "British Trials" —Filson Young—that in that case two people were charged on the same evidence with the same offence. If there was the slightest difference in degree in the offence—and I have taken the trouble to read up the case after my hon. and learned Friend referred to it in his speech —the evidence was rather stronger against Mrs. Seddon, but there is no question what the jury did. They said, "There is a doubt in this case. We do not want to convict both, so we will hang one of them," and they hanged the man. The judge indicated in his summing up that that was the sort of thing they could decide to do. It was very unpleasant for him to have to sentence a woman to death. Though when he found out Seddon was a Freemason, as was also the judge, he was very much moved.
§ The very important observations of my hon. and learned Friend led to the consideration of another matter. It really is true, not merely of the Seddon case, but if we take all the arsenical poisoning cases over the century and analyse them, that the experts said a different thing 890 every time. At one time, they were saying that chronic arsenical poisoning was a progressive poison, gathering its effect, while at others they are telling us that it is one of the most rapidly evacuated poisons from the body. Some experts said that if a lethal dose is administered, at one time it is effective in 48 hours, while others have said that it takes six or seven days. Yet the experts speak the words of oracles and their views are accepted as dogma.
§ Of course judges say, "Here is this distinguished Home Office expert. Here is this toxicologist, who acts for the Home Office. He must be a man of absolutely no prejudice. Why should he have any prejudice? He was asked to examine this matter on behalf of the Crown, and he came to it as an expert free from bias. You should have regard to what he says."
§ Once a Sir Bernard Spilsbury had gone into the witness box and given his evidence as to what he thought the postmortem examination of a body disclosed there was no one who could be put into the witness box to contradict him. One knew precisely what happened, and the specialists knew what happened. London was searched for an expert who was paid very large fees. The first questions put by counsel for the Crown to a witness contesting that evidence were: "Do you know how many postmortem examinations Sir Bernard Spilsbury has conducted? Do you know how often Sir Bernard Spilsbury has been called upon to seek arsenic in a body? How many times have you done it? How many examinations have you made?" There could be no answer, for there could never be put into the witness box in a criminal trial an expert who had anything like that experience.
§ Of course, defending solicitors often tried to do it. I described in some previous observations what we used to do when we could afford it and had the money to do so. To be fair to the gentleman concerned he may be still living—he was never avaricious in his fees.
§ Mr. HaleProfessor Glaister used to come from north of the Border to give evidence and it was very surprising that he always disagreed with Sir Bernard Spilsbury. It was also a very remarkable 891 thing that Sir Bernard used to go north of the Border and disagree with Professor Glaister. The same has happened with every couple of expert witnesses throughout the centuries. When Sir Albert Swaine Taylor used to go into the witness box the College of Surgeons used to say that he did not understand Marsh's test. We have had this disagreement on almost every occasion when there has been two expert witnesses. One of the most famous cases was when Spencer Cowper, grandfather of the poet, who became a judge of the High Court, was charged with murder. He stood in the dock and called his brother, who became a Lord Chancellor, to give evidence as to character.
He was charged with the murder of a lady who clearly had committed suicide. The reason he nearly hanged for murder was that the experts said she must have been dead before her body was put into the water as the body was found floating. We now know that all that was quite wrong. We know that the lady was found floating because she was wearing wide skirts, which kept her up in the water, as they had a slightly parachuting effect, but Spencer Cooper nearly hanged and we nearly lost a tolerably good judge and an excellent poet as a result.
It is nonsense to say that miscarriages of justice cannot occur and do not occur. I think our judicial system is a very fine system. It is the admiration and envy of many other countries. I have a great regard for it and for its administration, but it is no defence—it is a foolish defence —of any system which is essentially a system in which the final determination has to be made by twelve men in a box, not experts. not full of knowledge, applying their minds and applying the test of what the ordinary man in certain circumstances would do, to say that they cannot make a mistake. It is impossible to say that they cannot go wrong; of course they can go wrong. It is almost a defence of the system to admit that they can go wrong. Once we admit it, we ought to be jealous of the duty of seeing that so far as possible errors are corrected.
In the case of William Gardiner, who was tried twice on precisely the same evidence in what was known as the "Peasenhall" murder case, the jury disagreed on two occasions. On each occa- 892 sion he was defended by Sir Ernest Wilde and prosecuted by Sir Henry Dickens, and on each occasion the evidence was the same. At the first hearing, the jury were eleven to one for a conviction, and at the second hearing the jury were eleven to one for an acquittal. In those circumstances how can one say that there is no possibility of error? Had the one man been a little less firm on the first occasion, Gardiner would have hanged. Had the one man been a little less firm on the second occasion he would have been completely free. He was in fact freed by nolle prosequi. The records of our criminal courts contain many cases of error. My hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) called attention a few days ago to the case of Rowlands and spoke about it very informatively. In many ways the case of Rowlands was a classic case for an inquiry. I hope my hon. Friend will deal with that case in the course of this discussion. There is also the case of Evans, about which my hon. Friend and my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton have both written very movingly. I leave it to them, if they wish, to refer to that case. Does anyone suggest that the inquiry by the Home Office about the Evans case has cleared the public mind of anxiety? Does anyone really suggest that the public were completely reassured by the report given as a result of that inquiry? I find more difficulty in understanding how anyone can be reassured about the Evans case than I do about almost any contested case.
The history of France in this matter is perhaps a simpler history to deal with on the question of miscarriage of justice. The Cour de Cassation plays a similar rôle to our Court of Criminal Appeal, but it is empowered, and has been empowered for many years, with the right of retrial, the right to declare a man innocent, to award compensation, and even to declare the innocence of a man long since dead and to award declarations of innocence in the public papers. Most of us concerned with this matter, if we went across the Channel to look for examples, would recall the most moving of all the cases of miscarriage of justice, the case of Jean Calas in the early 18th century. There a Protestant family in a Catholic country—Huguenots 893 subject to the same disabilities as those to which Irish Catholics were subject by Protestants at the same time—went to the House of Peers in France for a rehearing and a reconsideration from the Catholic Peers of France after years of struggle and years of hostility.
The question whether the public mind is concerned about these matters can be answered by the fact that there is in existence a bibliography of the Jean Calas case. Well over one hundred volumes had been printed about it at the time that the bibliography was published some twenty years ago and more have been written since, including a book by a former Lord Chancellor, Lord Maugham. As sometimes happens—as happened in this House on 4th August, 1914—in a state of emergency we enact a great deal of legislation. The power of rehearing was repealed in France during the years of the Revolution. During the years of the Revolution, there was the case, in 1793, of Joseph Lesurques and the Lyons Mail, loaded with assiqnats—
§ The Temporary Chairman (Sir Norman Hulbert)I think the hon. Member might at least keep to British trials.
§ The Temporary ChairmanI said that if the hon. Member is going to cite cases he might cite cases which are British. Then we shall get on better.
§ Mr. HaleWould it not be a good idea, Sir Norman, to find what I am going to say before objecting to what I have not said? You might put me on the wrong course. I submit that I may talk about miscarriages of justice and give examples in reference to a proposed new Clause which says that something should be done to deal with miscarriages of justice.
§ 5.30 p.m.
§ Mr. PagetFurther to the point of order, Sir Norman. Surely my hon. Friend may refer to how miscarriages of justice are dealt with in a country where the Clause that we are proposing applies.
§ Mr. HaleI intend in the course of my speech, Sir Norman, to make reference to some miscarriages of justice. I do not 894 know how one can refer to a miscarriage of justice without saying how it was a miscarriage of justice, or how one can convince the Committee that one should try to take some steps to deal with miscarriages of justice unless one suggests that they have occurred. That is what I had in mind in approaching the problem.
The case of Lesurques was one which excited not merely France for half a century but England as well. It was one which Sir Henry Irving dramatised, and his son wrote brilliantly about it. It is a famous case, and was recently the subject of a full-length book in English by Sir Charles Oman. A set of circumstances occurred there which have not occurred in other cases of miscarriage of justice. The facts were in a very limited compass, and they were hardly in dispute.
Four horsemen had been seen wandering along the road which the Lyons mail would take on its journey with assignats for the pay of Napoleon's troops in Italy. The four horsemen were seen calling at various cafes. They were seen apparently hanging about for the mail to come along. One witness spoke of their inquiring about the mail. It was due to leave Paris in the afternoon, at what we should call teatime, and it had upon it the postilion, the manager of the mail—a man who had bought his appointment—and a single passenger. At dawn next morning the mail was found robbed on a little side road. One of the horses was missing, obviously having been ridden away by the mysterious passenger, who was an accomplice. The postilion and the manager of the mail had been murdered, and their bodies were found lying by the roadside.
The French police commenced their inquiries with a view to arresting the five men involved. They brought Lesurques and others to trial, and he was convicted, probably by the unhappy accident of an alteration in a day-book, produced in support of a strong alibi. I should have thought that day-books were made to be altered and that they were full of alterations. Lesurques was taken to the scaffold protesting his innocence and was executed. The man who was convicted with him—he was guilty—declared from the dock that Lesurques was innocent and repeated it on the scaffold. As the years went by more victims came in. Four or five people were hanged for the 895 offence. Altogether eight persons were found guilty of a crime which was committed by five.
I referred earlier to what happened to the power of the Cour de Cassation as a result of the Revolution. There grew up, not only from the family of Lesurques but from a body of men of good will who believed in justice, a demand for a revision. The demand went to the French Parliament, and eventually the Chamber of Deputies restored the confiscated estates and made financial provision for the widows, in that way trying to admit that a miscarriage of justice had occurred. Yet it was not until the 1870's, 80 years after the mail had made its journey, that the French Parliament was prevailed upon to empower the Cour de Cassation to have precisely the powers which I suggest that our Court of Criminal Appeal should have.
When the case of Lesurques came up for review, the Cour de Cassation decided against revision. It decided that although there was evidence that something had gone wrong, there was not enough evidence after all those years to say what it was that had gone wrong.
The second case dealt with by the Cour de Cassation is very little known, but it is very moving. It was the case of Baffer and Louarn. They were poor and friendliness men, and they were convicted of burglary with violence and robbery with violence. They were convicted on evidence which was very convincing. They were convicted on expert evidence which was not disputed. A year or two later when the real culprits were arrested and found guilty, the innocent Baffer and Louarn had both died in prison, one in the penal settlement of Cayenne, the other in the convict prison at Home.
There was no one to raise the case of Baffer and Louarn. There was no relative left to say "You cannot give us back their lives and all that we have been deprived of, but at least give those men a decent memory and the right to rest peacefully in their graves." There was no one who could initiate proceedings. No one had the right to bring the matter before the court. However, in pursuance of its powers, the Cour de Cassation said, "We have knowledge that this matter should be investigated." The issue was retried and the innocence of the men 896 was declared. A notice was published all over the land proclaiming their innocence.
What is the result of this? I ask the Committee to consider for two minutes what the result is. The result is an increased respect for the administration of justice. One does not impugn the authority of one's judiciary by saying that it can err. The Court of Appeal says very rude things about King's Bench judges every day, sometimes in terms which would be regarded here as unparliamentary. Time after time judges lay down the law in one court and have it re-laid in another. No one loses any of the faith he may have in our judiciary merely because it is capable of error. It is, indeed, a principle of our law that in the courts of justice errors are possible. My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Northampton has properly called attention to this. It is the principle of our law that one does not find a man guilty because he has committed a crime. One finds him guilty because he has been discovered in such circumstances that the reasonable conclusion is that he committed a crime.
That is no mere rhetorical or debating point. Let us imagine a young gentleman who takes a young lady down to a flat at Eastbourne. Perhaps for the moment I had better shift along the coast, although it was at Eastbourne that an ancient case occurred. Let us say that the young man takes the lady to some remote seaside cottage. No one knows what has happened, but we say, perfectly fairly, "If you take the trouble to cut up the body and bury it, it is no use coming along afterwards and saying that the lady accidentally fell and hit her head on a bucket." If over 50 years we have 100 cases, it is probable that one innocent person will have been hanged and that 99 guilty persons will have been hanged. We might say to Dr. Crippen, "Perhaps you did not poison your wife, and perhaps you administered poison for another purpose, but once you buried your wife in the cellar and bolted to America, you took a grave risk of hanging." In certain circumstances, one is more or less impelled by the gravity of the surrounding acts to say, "We cannot know, and do not know what occurred, but these are circumstances such that if a verdict of guilty were not recorded the 897 community would not be safe." It is what happens in every such case, and I think that it is important that it should happen. That being so, it is, of course, of very great importance that there should be some constant possibility of review.
I now come to another aspect. It is not generally understood, and never is generally understood by the public, that there is no appellate criminal jurisdiction in this country in the sense that no court normally has any power to rehear evidence, except under certain very special circumstances. There is no power of review. It is important that we should know that. Juries are sometimes criticised by judges, who sometimes openly express disagreement with the decisions of juries, but, once a jury has returned a verdict of guilty, there is virtually no appeal at all against that finding.
I know, of course—we all know—of the Wallace case, in which the Court of Criminal Appeal, in exercise of its very limited powers said, "This finding was so perverse, so unsupported by evidence that we are going to exercise a power we have never before exercised in a murder case, and order the release of Mr. Wallace."
§ Mr. Scholefield Allen (Crewe)I think that in that case the Court of Criminal Appeal went further than my hon. Friend says. It said, in fact, that there was no evidence of any kind whatsoever upon which twelve men and women could come to the conclusion that the man was guilty. It was suspicion, and suspicion only.
§ Mr. HaleI am grateful, of course, for that intervention. I thought it was as I was saying, but my hon. and learned Friend put it more clearly and as he was a learned counsel in the trial nobody has a better right to intervene and tell us what happened. There was no evidence, yet the jury found Wallace guilty and—my hon. and learned Friend can correct me—found him guilty after a very short retirement, almost immediately.
§ Mr. HaleAnd in defiance of the direction of the judge. It was not a very good or clear direction, but it certainly came down, towards the end of the summing up, to an expression of very considerable doubt. I remember that Sir Edward Marshall Hall said of one or two cases 898 in which the judge finally swung in favour of the prisoner, that he, Sir Edward, had got the man off, but that the judge wanted the credit.
Should we extend the powers of criminal appeal? I am sure, Sir Norman, that you would say that it was out of order to pursue that, both under the Clause and under the Bill, but, short of that alternative, which is a matter for long Parliamentary discussion and consideration, I suggest that this Clause does put before the Committee a simple opportunity of providing a simple procedure. If we are to let an appellate court have a right of rehearing at all, what more appropriate court than the Court of Criminal Appeal, already exercising a limited appellate jurisdiction?
If we are to give the court that right, then I have suggested that, if there is to be a full rehearing, it could be ordered by the Court of Criminal Appeal to take place before a court of first instance. But, in any event, that is largely a technical point. So long as there is some tribunal of Her Majesty's judges in which the public has confidence and which can have this right then, speaking for myself, I care little about the precise or detailed way in which the right is exercised, but it is important.
In the concluding few moments of this speech, let me just go back to a recollection of what has happened in the last half century. In the case of Timothy John Evans there was an inquiry. There was a recent case in which the right hon. and gallant Gentleman the former Home Secretary intervened, and cancelled the sentence. It was a case which involved so much violence that it might have resulted in death and in which, I think, the evidence left no doubt in the mind of the jury.
5.45 p.m.
Anyone who cares to refer to the biographies of great advocates will find that, allowing even for the necessary partisanship which involves an advocate, there was case after case in which the advocates themselves had no idea what the verdict would be at the moment when the jury returned; and case after case in which advocates were convinced that the verdict given was not that which ought to have been given. It is said that Sir Charles Russell never expressed a view of 899 the innocence of Mrs. Maybrick, but he very often expressed the view that she should never have been convicted, which comes nearly to the same thing. In many cases there were grave doubts in the minds of the spectators.
One recollects the case of Oscar Slater, the story of which has never yet been fully told, the facts of which have been suppressed—and the police officer who had the guts and the courage to try to bring the facts to light was broken and sacked. That was a scandal which in some ways involved high places and approached the disreputability of the case against Dreyfus. Oscar Slater's was a case which was finally the subject of a retrial under an Act passed specially for that purpose, precisely because this Clause did not exist. It was found that if there was to be a rehearing of the case, a special Act of Parliament was necessary to make it possible, and that special Act was passed.
One could hardly quote a more obvious example in support of the necessity of this Clause, because if similar situations arose again we would have to pass a special Act in each case. The Joint Under-Secretary will recall that it was the intervention of the late Sir Arthur Conan Doyle which led to the reinvestigation of the Slater case. That was not the only case that came to the notice of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. There was the even more astounding case of George Edalji, to which I want to allude.
Edalji was the son of a Parsee Church of England Minister who was the rector of, I think, Rugeley, or of a village near Rugeley. He was a young solicitor. He was charged with maiming cattle, and also with sending abusive letters, some of which abused his father, his family, his relations, and so on. The man who wrote the abusive letters had an extraordinary admiration for the local police.
Edalji was brought to trial. Practically no record was kept of the evidence. When it became a question of looking up the trial one could hardly find adequate records of the evidence against him. He was brought before quarter sessions and sentenced, I think, to seven years' imprisonment—certainly not less than five. He was, of course, struck off the roll of solicitors. There was not any evidence against him.
900 In the case of Edalji, the police had watched the house at night to see if he went out. They had not seen him go out, yet that was not recorded as a circumstance in his favour. They had seen nobody leave the house. He was so shortsighted, he suffered from such chronic myopia, that he could not have seen an elephant, never mind the hoof of a horse or a cow—whatever the animal was.
Edalji was a reserved, retrospective young solicitor, practising in Birmingham and writing books on railway law. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle took up the case, and I must say that it is to the credit of the Daily Telegraph that it put at Sir Arthur's disposal practically two central pages for him to say what he thought about that case.
What happened in that case? A Select Committee of this House considered the matter. In the Edalji case we had evidence from handwriting experts. The same people who gave false evidence against Adolph Beck gave false evidence against Edalji and identified the handwriting. The Select Committee, sitting after Edalji had served his sentence, reported that he was innocent of the crime of cattle maiming, but they thought that he had written the anonymous letters. They left him with his character really unredeemed, because they reported that he had contributed by his folly to his own conviction and that he had written these letters which disturbed the neighbourhood.
I remember that a quarter of a century later a man was brought up at Rugeley police court and convicted of writing anonymous letters. The police said—it was not much publicised at the time—that they were now satisfied that this was the man who had written the letters in a case of great fame which had occurred a quarter of a century ago. The name of Edalji was not mentioned, but it was clearly indicated. The Select Committee who left him with the slur of writing the letters were wrong, just as the jury were wrong in finding him guilty in the first place, and Conan Doyle was vindicated. There was no evidence that Edalji had written the letters. There was not the slightest motive for his having written the letters. Only a chief constable who had lied several times in the matter and the prejudice against the Parsee brought about his conviction.
901 It is no use saying that these things cannot happen now. I have seen prejudice occur. Anyone who practised in the courts in 1926 will know that there can be times when there is a great deal more prejudice than justice about. Of course, anyone who represents respectable people of enemy alien nationality in time of war knows the extent to which prejudice can be introduced into courts. We have seen it happen. It is no use anyone on the other side of the Committee saying that this cannot be so. I beg the Attorney-General to say that he will take this Clause under his wing, even if it means a Report stage, now that we have this opportunity to right a wrong. In conclusion, I should like to apologise for a discourtesy to my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne when I rose to speak.
§ Mr. S. SilvermanThe Committee has been treated by my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale) to a fascinating review of a long series of established miscarriages of justice both here and abroad, and I rejoice that I did not for more than a moment stand between him and the Committee in his doing so. However, perhaps he will add to this long and distinguished record of miscarriages of justice one minor one, and that is connected with the new evidence in a documentary form.
§ Mr. John Paton (Norwich, North)Why not share it with the Committee?
§ Mr. SilvermanIt is a secret of my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West. He can refer to it himself if he wishes to do so.
The point to which I wish to draw the Committee's attention in supporting the proposed new Clause is the precise manner in which the Clause seeks to introduce new safeguards against the persistence of miscarriages of justice when new evidence teas been discovered in time. What the Clause does is to give to the Court of Criminal Appeal in certain exceptional cases a power which it does not at present possess, that is to say, the power to order a new trial. Those of us who took part in the Committee stage of the Criminal Justice Act, 1948, will remember a very long controversy that took place there on the question of whether the Court of Criminal Appeal should or 902 should not be given the power to order a retrial in a case where a conviction which was appealed against could not, in its opinion, be supported. I opposed giving the Court of Criminal Appeal that power, and the Committee, and subsequently the House also, were of that opinion, and the Court of Criminal Appeal was refused the power.
In most cases, and on principle, I remain of that opinion today. I think that if a conviction has been obtained and if, on appeal, the Court of Criminal Appeal is satisfied that the conviction cannot be maintained, the proper course is to quash the conviction and acquit the accused instead of submitting him a second time to the ordeal of a trial, not merely because it is unfair to the man, but because in those circumstances a second trial which shall be a fair trial is virtually impossible. I do not want to dilate upon that further, because this is not the occasion for it. I only mention it in order to show why, in the particular circumstances of this Clause, I think that the Court of Criminal Appeal might well have such a power.
I know that the Committee has listened to a number of cases. I want to illustrate my argument by reference to one more case. Sometimes it is very much easier to see the bearing of an argument of this kind in relation to the known and accepted facts of a particular case than it is in generalisations or arguments about principles. I refer to a case which my hon. Friend has mentioned, but did not dilate upon, the case of Walter Graham Rowland.
In that case a man was convicted in Manchester of the murder of a prostitute on a bombed site. He was convicted largely on the evidence, as I understand, of three people who saw a man at different times whom they had never seen before in different circumstances, and for a few moments only, and who differed fundamentally amongst themselves as to the physical attributes of the man they identified.
6.0 p.m.
The conviction which was obtained was in the highest degree doubtful and unsatisfactory, even as the case stood in the Manchester Assize Court. I should have thought that no professional man reading the transcript now could justify or, indeed, understand how any one could 903 have thought that on that evidence Rowland could possibly be fairly convicted.
That, however, is not the point which is relevant to the discussions now. It happened that after Rowland was convicted and while he was awaiting execution, another man in another prison went to the governor of that prison and said, "I have been reading about the conviction of a man called Rowland for the murder of a prostitute in Manchester on a bombed site. Rowland is not guilty I know he is not guilty, because I committed that murder myself." He said it in a three or four line statement made to the prison governor, who communicated it to the Manchester police and to the legal representatives of Rowland.
There were two independent interviews in the prison. At one of them this man, whose name was Ware, made a statement to Rowland's solicitor, this time a long and circumstantial proof taken with all the care that an experienced solicitor and counsel can display in dealing with matters of the first importance. The other statement, by this time the third statement, was taken by the Manchester police and was itself a long and detailed account giving a full and circumstantial report of the man's movements over all the relevant dates. Armed with that evidence, Rowland's advisers went to the Court of Criminal Appeal and asked for leave to call further evidence.
My hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West said that in our criminal appeals there is not a rehearing, there is not a trial, there is not a hearing of evidence. He was perfectly right, except that where an appellant can satisfy the Court of Criminal Appeal on two points, then the Court of Criminal Appeal should and will hear fresh evidence.
The two points on which an appellant has to satisfy the Court of Criminal Appeal before fresh evidence will be admitted and heard are these. First, he has to establish that the evidence is really new in the sense that he did not have it in his possession at the time of the trial and that no reasonable inquiry on his part could have put him in possession of that evidence. In other words, he must show not merely that he did not have the evidence, but that it was no fault of his and no fault of his advisers that the evidence was not originally available.
904 The second point he has to establish is that this new evidence is such that, had it been heard by the jury together with the other evidence which they did hear, it is reasonable to suppose that it might have had an effect upon the result. In other words, he has to prove, first, that it is new, and second, that it is material. It is, of course, evidence of that kind which is contemplated here and which is indeed referred to in terms in the new Clause. It was that kind of case which my hon. Friend had in mind when, as he told the Committee, he drafted this new Clause and put it down in the hope that it might be considered and accepted.
One would have thought that Rowland was in a position in which he could easily satisfy the Court of Criminal Appeal that he had new evidence in both those senses. He did not know and could not have known about Ware's confession at his trial because Ware had not made it at his trial; it was evidence which was not merely new in that highly technical sense, but it was evidence which came into being for the first time after the trial was over. Further, it is the jury's business to judge the truth or honesty of witnesses and the value of evidence given before them, and it is very difficult indeed to see how anyone could fail to satisfy the Court of Criminal Appeal that, if the jury had had this confession and the man who made it before them, they might possibly or might reasonably have come to another conclusion.
The Court of Criminal Appeal did not contest either that the evidence was fresh evidence or that it was material evidence; but it disallowed the application because it felt another and quite different difficulty. That difficulty, if I understand the judgments delivered, was this. The court said, "If we hear this man Ware and if we come to the conclusion that, if the jury had heard him, they might have acquitted Rowland, we have no power to order a new trial, but we can only acquit Rowland. If we acquit Rowland in those circumstances, that may be held to be tantamount to a conviction of Ware. Therefore, if we allow this application and hear this evidence, and if we allow the appeal and acquit Rowland, then inevitably Ware will be tried, and tried in circumstances in which he cannot have a fair trial if he should then say that his confession was false. Everyone will 905 say that the Court of Criminal Appeal has acquitted Rowland on Ware's evidence, so how on earth can one say that Ware is not guilty?"
This is not the place to argue with the decisions of the Court of Criminal Appeal. I felt then and I feel now-I have taken some pains to publish the opinion—that the Court of Criminal Appeal was hopelessly wrong and that its decision was quite out of accord with its whole line of criminal appeal decisions on this point. But mark what follows. The Court of Criminal Appeal said there were other methods; the Home Secretary had other: powers open to him which would enable him to do what the Court felt it could not do. The Court did not explain why a conviction of Ware by a Home Office inquiry would be less prejudicial than a decision by the Court of Criminal Appeal. It did not appear to have gone into that matter. Indeed, such a decision would have been much more prejudicial, because all the Court of Criminal Appeal was asked to decide was that the new evidence might, not necessarily would, have produced a different result which would have been less prejudicial to him.
The Home Secretary, acting on that, appointed Mr. John Catterall Jolly, K.C., to conduct an inquiry, and he appointed to act with him a most experienced police officer. If he was an experienced police officer even in those days, he is a much more experienced police officer now: he is now Chief Superintendent Hannam. He was appointed to assist Mr. Jolly in his inquiry. The inquiry was in secret. Neither Rowland nor his counsel was entitled to be present at it in any adequate sense. There was no giving of evidence, leading of evidence or cross-examining of evidence.
We know only this from Mr. Jolly's report. Ware, be it remembered, had three times voluntarily confessed on two of the occasions with the utmost circumstantial detail. Mr. Jolly and Mr. Hannam went to see him and they said in their report: "At first he persisted in his confession, but then withdrew it and made a new statement." There is not a word in the report of what took place between his at first persisting in the confession and then ultimately withdrawing it; we are not told at what interval of time, whether in anybody's presence, under what kind 906 of questioning, if any kind of questioning, or under what kind of warning, if any kind of warning. Just the things that, as my hon. Friend quite rightly said, would have been brought out in detail at a public trial in the light of day. This inquiry was to take the place of such a trial. This secret withdrawal was to take place in secret without any of the safeguards which publicly confers on the administration of any judicial system.
There followed, however, another very long and circumstantial statement which appeared in the report, the one of which Mr. Jolly said he was satisfied that it was true; and because he was satisfied that that was true, he reported to the Home Secretary that there was no reason whatever to fear that there was any miscarriage of justice in the conviction of Rowland. And yet it required hardly more than a casual reading of that final statement of retraction to ascertain that it could not possibly be true as it was made.
The experienced lawyer, with judicial experience—he was a recorder—and the experienced police officer had overlooked an elementary fact, the elementary fact being that if certain events happened upon Saturday afternoon and evening and there is then a night following upon those events, the morning after is Sunday morning and not Saturday morning. It is as simple as that. On that statement, Rowland was hanged.
I am sorry that my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Mr. Ede) is not present. He was then Home Secretary. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Newport (Sir F. Soskice) was then Solicitor-General and my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Helens (Sir H. Shawcross) was then Attorney-General. When that report came out, I went to see them both, because it seemed to me that the decision of the Court of Criminal Appeal was so out of line with a long line of its own decisions and so wrong and raised a question of such public importance that the Attorney-General ought to grant his fiat to enable that decision to go to the House of Lords.
6.15 p.m.
I failed to persuade them, although my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Newport put up with me for nearly seven hours that day. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for St. Helens put up with the first hour and the last 907 half hour of it. Perhaps that is why he remained obdurate to the end, whereas my right hon. and learned Friend the Member for Newport showed signs of weakening before the argument concluded. I think he was a little shaken, but in the end was overruled by the Attorney-General of the day, and, of course, it was the Attorney-General's fiat which was required and not the Solicitor-General's. However, the fiat was in the end refused. I believe that there was some approach to my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields, who said, quite properly, that if a fiat was to be issued, he would grant a reprieve. "If you tell me there is any doubt," he said, "I will give you a reprieve at once, but if you do not tell me either of those things, what can I do?" The man was hanged next morning.
It seems to me that in cases of that kind, if the Court of Criminal Appeal is for any reason to feel itself inhibited from hearing evidence proffered to it, evidence which is new, evidence which is material and evidence on which a man's life—it may be, an innocent man's life—may depend, we must in those special circumstances give the Court of Criminal Appeal the power that it would have if the Clause were accepted.
If the Court does not want to hear the evidence itself, do not let somebody say, "Let the evidence be heard by somebody appointed by the Home Secretary" somebody who is under no obligation to allow anybody else to be present, under no obligation to take evidence on oath, under no obligation to provide opportunities for cross-examination and who will not have the assistance of a jury in deciding the questions of fact which it is proper under our system that the jury and not the court shall decide—but let it go back to a court of first instance, with a judge, with a jury and with the evidence in open court examined and cross-examined and decided upon in the end by the unanimous verdict of twelve jurors.
I confessed at the beginning that I would not seek to make a case for a general power in the Court of Criminal Appeal to order retrials—I do not like it; I do not think it is right, fair, practical or just. But I still say that in cases of this kind, if there are not to be continued miscarriages of justice, we must 908 give to the Court of Criminal Appeal the power of ordering a new trial.
§ Mr. WeitzmanThe Committee has heard recounted a number of cases where miscarriages of justice have come about. I do not propose to add to the number that have been mentioned to the Committee and I agree very strongly with what my hon. Friend the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) said regarding the question of a new trial. I only intervene for one moment to mention what I consider to be a point of substance with regard to this matter.
The Committee will be aware that under the Criminal Appeal Act. 1907, notice of appeal has to be given within ten days, but there is power to make an application to the Court to extend the time for appeal in every case except in the case of a conviction involving sentence of death. That means that in the case of a capital murder where the death sentence has been passed, and even where the sentence has been commuted, if new evidence is discovered after ten days there can be no appeal by the accused person.
I agree that there are, of course, powers with the Home Secretary, but no power exists under the Criminal Appeal Act now for the accused after ten days to make such an appeal. One of the reasons I support the proposed new Clause is that I think it will obviously appear to the Committee to be quite unfair that where a person is condemned to death and where the sentence is commuted and a period of ten days or more has elapsed and new evidence is discovered there should be no power then on the part of the convicted person to appeal against that sentence. I think that is a point of substance, and I desired to put it to the Committee.
§ Mr. SimonThis new Clause has been moved—I hope it will not be impertinent if I say this—in the sort of terms and spirit which is bound to appeal to the Committee. I hope that all of us in this Chamber are animated by the continual desire to see that justice is done and manifestly seen to be done, particularly those of us who are lawyers and who have enjoyed the intellectual pursuit of the law and the fun of collision in the courts. However, I am sure hon. and learned 909 Members will bear me out when I say that what makes our job ultimately rewarding is the consciousness that we are, however humble, acolytes in the temple of justice. Therefore, the way in which a case is put is bound to appeal to us.
In addition—and, again, I hope that it will not be thought impertinent if I say this—the hon. Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale), who, the other day, gave us a great comic epic, today gave us the benefit of further examples of his great erudition and learning in this branch of the criminal law, and the hon. Gentleman the Member for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman), who has, I know, made a profound study of the Rowland case—I read his publication on it—has given us again an extremely persuasive account of the case.
I am bound to point out, however, that in the Rowland case there would still, as I understand, if this new Clause were accepted, have been the necessity of an extra-judicial inquiry. That was certainly the view of the Departmental Committee on New Trials in Criminal Cases, which reported in 1954 and which expressly referred to the Rowland case. In recommending, in limited circumstances, the power to be given to the Court of Criminal Appeal it said:
In our view, for example, the existence of power to order a new trial would not have made it possible to dispense with the inquiries which were held in the cases of Rowland in 1947 and of Devlin and Burns in 1952.I do not think that it would be of any value if I were to discuss the case of Rowland in detail. It has been frequently discussed in this Chamber, and, as the hon. Gentleman said, and as one would know, carefully considered at the time by right hon. and learned Gentlemen opposite in whose judgment in these matters we have learned to have great respect, and it would, I think, be impertinent and unprofitable if I were to attempt to reopen that case.The hon. Gentleman the Member for Nelson and Colne started off by saying that, in principle, he objected to a power to be given to the appellate criminal court to order a new trial; and, of course, this is a matter on which opinion, both legal and lay, is sharply divided. As he reminded the Committee, the Lords, in 910 1948, amended the Criminal Justice Bill in such a way as to give this power to the appellate criminal court, and the House of Commons disagreed with the Lords in their Amendment. I have read the debates which took place. Weighty reasons were given, by the hon. Member himself and the hon. and learned Member for Nortnampton (Mr. Paget), and my right hon. Friend spoke in the same sense.
Since that time the matter has been referred to the Departmental Committee to which I have referred. It recommended that in certain specific cases there should be a power to order a new trial. In particular, it recommended that
the Court of Criminal Appeal should be empowered to order a new trial of a convicted person where the appeal is based on grounds of fresh evidence.I shall refer to other recommendations later. It went on, by a majority of five to three, to recommend thatthe Court of Criminal Appeal should not be empowered to order a new trial of a convicted person except in cases where the appeal is based on grounds of new evidence.The hon. Member for Nelson and Colne gave a number of reasons why to a great many people the proposal for a new trial in criminal cases is objectionable. A number of those reasons are set out in the Report of the Departmental Committee, the most important being that it is contrary to the fundamental principle that no man should be put in peril a second time on the same charge; that it would be difficult to ensure a fair trial for the accused on the second occasion; that it would be unfair to the accused person to be put through the ordeal and made to bear the expense of a second trial; and, finally, that it would be difficult to distinguish between those cases in which the power should be exercised and those in which a verdict of acquittal should be substituted.It is for those reasons that many people, though by no means all, think that the proper decision of the appellate criminal court, which is satisfied that there is sufficient reason to think that there may have been a miscarriage of justice or an error of law, is acquittal rather than a new trial. As I understand, the hon. Gentleman approaches the whole problem from that angle, though many hon. Members, I know, feel that the Court of 911 Criminal Appeal and the House of Lords should have this power.
The Government have not yet made any pronouncement on the Report of the Departmental Committee. I do not doubt that today's debate will be taken into account, and that the speeches which have been made will be weighed carefully when a decision is come to. Also, I do not doubt that the views which have been put forward will weigh with the Government in deciding whether legislation should be introduced to give effect to the Committee's recommendations.
6.30 p.m.
The Government are unable to accept the new Clause for a number of reasons, some of which are of more weight than others. I will give the minor ones and say right away that I know that hon. Members will say that they are the sort of points that could be put right on Report, but it is my duty to put forward various deficiencies in a new Clause when the Committee is weighing whether it should be passed into law or not.
In the first place, although the Clause is in line with the Departmental Committee's recommendations, it gives no power to the House of Lords to order a new trial, although the Departmental Committee so recommended. Further, it does not give to the Court of Criminal Appeal power to do so where there has been a reference to the Court of Criminal Appeal by the Home Secretary under Section 19 of the Criminal Appeal Act, 1907, although the Departmental Committee so recommended in paragraph 41 of its Report.
§ Mr. S. SilvermanI am sure that the hon. and learned Gentleman would agree that, so far as the House of Lords is concerned, that would be almost irrelevant to the Clause, because the Clause deals with new trial on the ground solely of new evidence, and no case would go to the House of Lords except on a point of law.
§ Mr. SimonThat is true, but a point of law may arise on the relevance and admissibility of fresh evidence. I agree, in general, that it would be true that a point of law would be unlikely in such circumstances, but it could arise on a question of admissibility. I have said already that I do not think it would be 912 helpful if I debated the Rowland case. Since Section 19 of the 1907 Act was passed, four capital cases have been referred to the Court of Criminal Appeal under that provision.
I should like to refer to the points made by the hon. and learned Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman). He points out the restriction on the extension of time for appeal in cases of murder. We all know the reason for that. The hon. and learned Member for Northampton mentioned it the other day. It is that under our system we discountenance the protraction of criminal cases, particularly those where the capital penalty is at issue. That provision remained unamended in the Criminal Justice Act, 1948, and, I think, is consonant with the general feeling of penologists in this country. I think that the answer to the hon. and learned Member is Section 19. In other words, there is power in the Home Secretary, when fresh evidence becomes available for him, on his own initiative to ask the Court of Criminal Appeal to re-examine the case and hear it, in effect, as an appeal.
The main reason why the new Clause cannot be accepted despite the persuasive arguments put forward in its support, is that it confines the new trials procedure to convictions for murder or capital murder, and, in the Government's view, there is no justification for that. If the Departmental Committee's recommendations are to be implemented, it should be in a Bill applying them to all types of crime. I know that it can be said that this is a case where capital sentence is involved, but that is not so under the new Clause, which goes beyond capital murder and extends to the crime of murder as well.
It is for those reasons that I advise the Committee to reject the Clause if it is pressed to a Division, but I am able to give the Committee an assurance that the debate today will be carefully weighed by the Government in considering whether legislative enactment should be given over the whole field of criminal law to the recommendations of the Departmental Committee.
§ Mr. Anthony GreenwoodWe have had from this side of the Committee three speeches of great erudition, from my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham, West (Mr. Hale), my hon. Friend the Member 913 for Nelson and Colne (Mr. S. Silverman) and my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Stoke Newington and Hackney, North (Mr. Weitzman), The Joint Under-Secretary has given a sympathetic and courteous reply to my hon. Friends, but not one that I personally find at all satisfactory. I agree with the hon. and learned Gentleman on one point. I join with him in not wishing to comment on the cases either of Rowland or Evans or upon the inquiries which were conducted, I think, by Mr. Jolly and Mr. Scott Henderson.
The only thing that I want to say about those cases and those inquiries is that I do not think that either inquiry went all the way towards allaying the public anxiety which was felt about the decisions of the court. Indeed, for many of us, it increased the anxieties that we felt. I should have thought that the procedure of having these inquiries was not altogether satisfactory. If we could have
§ the provision in the new Clause embodied in the Bill it would go a long way towards convincing the public as a whole that possible miscarriages of justice of this kind would be less likely to occur in the future than they have been in the past.
§ We ought to try to make swifter progress with the debate if we can, and I therefore conclude by saying that I regret that the hon. and learned Gentleman has had to tell us that the Government have not yet made up their minds about the Report of the Departmental Committee on New Trials. As a spur to greater endeavour and action on the part of the Government, we find it necessary to press the new Clause to a Division.
§ Question put, That the Clause be read a Second time: —
§ The Committee divided: Ayes 189, Noes 228.
917| Division No. 48.] | AYES | [6.36 p.m. |
| Ainsley, J. W. | Fernyhough, E. | King, Dr. H. M. |
| Allaun, Frank (Salford, E.) | Fienburgh, W. | Lawson, G. M. |
| Aden, Scholefield (Crewe) | Fletcher, Eric | Lee, Frederick (Newton) |
| Awbery, S. S. | Forman, J. C. | Lee, Miss Jennie (Cannock) |
| Bacon, Miss Alice | Fraser, Thomas (Hamilton) | Lever, Leslie (Ardwick) |
| Balfour, A. | Gaitskell, Rt. Hon. H. T. N. | Lewis, Arthur |
| Benn, Hn. Wedgwood (Bristol, S.E.) | Gibson, C. W. | Lindgren, G. S. |
| Benson, G. | Gordon Walker, Rt. Hon. P. C. | Lipton, Marcus |
| Bevan, Rt. Hon. A. (Ebbw Vale) | Greenwood, Anthony | Mabon, Dr. J. Dickson |
| Blackburn, F. | Grenfell, Rt. Hon. D. R. | MacColl J. E. |
| Blenkinsop, A. | Griffiths, Rt. Hon. James (Llanelly) | McGovern, J. |
| Blyton, W. R. | Griffiths, William (Exchange) | McInnes, J. |
| Boardman, H. | Grimond, J. | McKay, John (Wallsend) |
| Bottomley, Rt. Hon. A. G. | Hale, Leslie | McLeavy, Frank |
| Bowden, H. W. (Leicester, S.W.) | Hall, Rt. Hn. Glenvil (Colne Valley) | MacPherson, Malcolm (Stirling) |
| Bowles, F. G. | Hamilton, W. W. | Matron, Simon |
| Boyd, T. C. | Harrison, J. (Nottingham, N.) | Marquand, Rt. Hon. H. A. |
| Braddock, Mrs. Elizabeth | Hayman, F. H. | Mason, Roy |
| Brockway, A. F. | Healey, Denis | Mitchison, G. R. |
| Brown, Rt. Hon. George (Belper) | Herbison, Miss M. | Moody, A. S. |
| Brown, Thomas (Ince) | Hobson, C. R. | Morris, Percy (Swansea, W.) |
| Burke, W. A. | Holman, P. | Mort, D. L. |
| Butler, Herbert (Hackney, C.) | Holmes, Horace | Moyle, A. |
| Butler, Mrs. Joyce (Wood Green) | Holt, A. F. | Neal, Harold (Bolsover) |
| Callaghan, L. J. | Houghton, Douglas | Oliver, G. H. |
| Castle, Mrs. B. A. | Howell, Charles (Perry Barr) | Oswald, T. |
| Champion, A. J. | Hoy, J. H. | Owen, W. J. |
| Chetwynd, G. R. | Hubbard, T. F. | Padley, W. E. |
| Clunie, J. | Hughes, Cledwyn (Anglesey) | Paling, Rt. Hon. W. (Dearne Valley) |
| Coldrick, W. | Hughes, Emrys (S. Ayrshire) | Palmer, A. M. F. |
| Collick, P. H. (Birkenhead) | Hughes, Hector (Aberdeen, N.) | Pannell, Charles (Leeds, W.) |
| Cove, W. G. | Hunter, A. E. | Pargiter, G. A. |
| Craddock, George (Bradford, S.) | Hynd, J. B. (Attercliffe) | Parker, J. |
| Crossman, R. H. S. | Irving, Sydney (Dartford) | Parkin, B. T. |
| Cullen, Mrs. A. | Isaacs, Rt. Hon. G. A. | Paton, John |
| Davies, Ernest (Enfield, E.) | Janner, B. | Pearson, A. |
| Davies, Harold (Leek) | Jay, Rt. Hon. D. P. T. | Peart, T. F. |
| Davies, Stephen (Merthyr) | Jeger, Mrs. Lena (Holbn & St. Pncs, S.) | Pentland, N. |
| Delargy, H. J. | Johnson, James (Rugby) | Plummer, Sir Leslie |
| Dodds, N. N. | Jones, Rt. Hon. A. Creech (Wakefield) | Price, J. T. (Westhoughton) |
| Dugdale, Rt. Hn. John (W. Brmwch) | Jones, David (The Hartlepools) | Price, Philips (Gloucestershire, W.) |
| Dye, S. | Jones, Elwyn (W. Ham, S.) | Probert, A. R. |
| Ede, Rt. Hon. J. C. | Jones, Jack (Rotherham) | Proctor, W. T. |
| Edwards, Rt. Hon. Ness (Caerphilly) | Jones, J. Idwal (Wrexham) | Randall, H. E. |
| Edwards, Robert (Bilston) | Jones, T. W. (Merioneth) | Redhead, E. C. |
| Edwards, W. J. (Stepney) | Kenyon, C. | Reeves, J. |
| Evans, Edward (Lowestoft) | Key, Rt. Hon. C. W. | Roberts, Albert (Normanton) |
| Roberts, Goronwy (Caernarvon) | Strauss, Rt. Hon. George (Vauxhall) | White, Henry (Derbyshire, N.E.) |
| Rogers, George (Kensington, N.) | Summerskill, Rt. Hon. E. | Wigg, George |
| Ross, William | Sylvester, G. O. | Wilkins, W. A. |
| Royle, C. | Taylor, Bernard (Mansfield) | Willey, Frederick |
| Shinwell, Rt. Hon. E. | Taylor, John (West Lothian) | Williams, Rev. Llywelyn (Ab'tillery) |
| Silverman, Julius (Aston) | Thomas, George (Cardiff) | Williams, Ronald (Wigan) |
| Silverman, Sydney (Nelson) | Thomas, Iorwerth (Rhondda, W.) | Williams, Rt. Hon. T. (Don Valley) |
| Simmons, C. J. (Brierley Hill) | Thornton, E. | Williams, W. R. (Openshaw) |
| Skeffington, A. M. | Timmons, J. | Williams, W.T. (Barons Court) |
| Slater, Mrs. H. (Stoke, N.) | Ungoed-Thomas, Sir Lynn | Willis, Eustace (Edinburgh, E.) |
| Smith, Ellis (Stoke, s.) | Usborne, H. C. | Wilson, Rt. Hon. Harold (Huyton) |
| Soskice, Rt. Hon. Sir Frank | Viant, S. P. | Woodburn, Rt. Hon. A. |
| Sparks, J. A. | Wade, D. W. | Woof, R. E. |
| Steele, T. | Warbey, W. N. | Zilliacus, K. |
| Stewart, Michael (Fulham) | Weitzman, D. | |
| Stones, W. (Consett) | West, D. G. | TELLERS FOR THE AYES: |
| Strachey, Rt. Hon. J. | Wheeldon, W. E. | Mr. Short and Mr. Deer. |
| NOES | ||
| Agnew, Sir Peter | Fisher, Nigel | Lucas-Tooth, Sir Hugh |
| Aitken, W. T. | Fletcher-Cooke, C. | Macdonald, Sir Peter |
| Allan, R. A. (Paddington, S.) | Fort, R. | McKibbin, A. J. |
| Alport, C. J. M. | Fraser, Hon. Hugh (Stone) | Mackie, J. H. (Galloway) |
| Amery, Julian (Preston, N.) | Fraser, Sir Ian (M'cmbe & Lonsdale) | McLaughlin, Mrs. P. |
| Anstruther-Gray, Major Sir William | Galbraith, Hon. T. G. D. | Maclay, Rt. Hon. John |
| Arbuthnot, John | Garner-Evans, E. H. | Maclean, Fitzroy (Lancaster) |
| Armstrong, C. W. | George, J. C. (Pollok) | McLean, Neil (Inverness) |
| Ashton, H. | Gomme-Duncan, Col. Sir Alan | Macleod, Rt. Hn. Iain (Enfield, W.) |
| Atkins, H. E. | Gower, H. R. | MacLeod, John (Ross & Cromarty) |
| Baldwin, A. E. | Grant, W. (Woodside) | Macpherson, Niall (Dumfries) |
| Barlow, Sir John | Grant-Ferris, Wg. Cdr. R.(Nantwich) | Maddan, Martin |
| Barter, John | Green, A. | Maitland, Cdr. J. F. W. (Horncastle) |
| Baxter, Sir Beverley | Grosvenor, Lt.-Col. R. G. | Maitland, Hon. Patrick (Lanark) |
| Beamish, Maj. Tufton | Gurden, Harold | Manningham-Buller, Rt. Hn. Sir R. |
| Bell, Philip (Bolton, E.) | Hall, John (Wycombe) | Mariowe, A. A. H. |
| Bell, Ronald (Bucks, S.) | Harris, Frederic (Croydon, N.W.) | Marples, A. E. |
| Bevins, J. R. (Toxteth) | Harris, Reader (Heston) | Marshall, Douglas |
| Bidgood, J. C. | Harrison, Col. J. H. (Eye) | Mathew, R. |
| Biggs-Davison, J. A. | Harvey, Air Cdre. A. V. (Macclesfd) | Maude, Angus |
| Birch, Rt. Hon. Nigel | Heald, Rt. Hon. Sir Lionel | Mawby, R. L. |
| Bishop, F. P. | Heath, Rt. Hon. E. R. G. | Maydon, Lt.-Comdr. S. L. C. |
| Body, R. F. | Hesketh, R. F. | Milligan, Rt. Hon. W. R. |
| Bossom, Sir Alfred | Hicks-Beach, Maj. W. W. | Morrison, John (Salisbury) |
| Boyle, Sir Edward | Hill, Rt. Hon. Charles (Luton) | Nabarro, G. D. N. |
| Braithwaite, Sir Albert (Harrow, W.) | Hill, Mrs. E. (Wythenshawe) | Nairn, D. L. S. |
| Bromley-Davenport, Lt.-Col. W. H. | Hill, John (S. Norfolk) | Nicholls, Harmar |
| Brooke, Rt. Hon. Henry | Hinchingbrooke, Viscount | Nicholson, Godfrey (Farnham) |
| Brooman-White, R. C. | Holland-Martin, C. J. | Nicolson, N. (B'n'm'th, E. & Chr'ch) |
| Bryan, P. | Hope, Lord John | Nugent, G. R. H. |
| Bullus, Wing Commander E. E. | Hornby, R. P. | Oakshott, H. D. |
| Burden, F. F. A. | Hornsby-Smith, Miss M. P. | Ormsby-Gore, Rt. Hon. W. D. |
| Butcher, Sir Herbert | Horobin, Sir Ian | Orr, Capt. L. P. S. |
| Butler, Rt. Hn. R. A. (Saffron Walden) | Howard, Hon. Greville (St. Ives) | Orr-Ewing, Charles Ian (Hendon, N.) |
| Carr, Robert | Hughes Hallett, Vice-Admiral J. | Osborne, C. |
| Cary, Sir Robert | Hughes-Young, M. H. C. | Page, R. G. |
| Chichester-Clark, R. | Hurd, A. R. | Pannell, N. A. (Kirkdale) |
| Clarke, Brig. Terence (Portsmth, W.) | Hylton-Foster, Rt. Hon. Sir Harry | Peyton, J. W. W. |
| Cole, Norman | Iremonger, T. L. | Pickthorn, K. W. M. |
| Conant, Maj. Sir Roger | Irvine, Bryant Godman (Rye) | Pilkington, Capt. R. A. |
| Cooper-Key, E. M. | Jenkins, Robert (Dulwich) | Pott, H. P. |
| Cordeaux, Lt.-Col. J. K. | Jennings, J. C. (Burton) | Powell, J. Enoch |
| Corfield, Capt. F. V. | Johnson, Dr. Donald (Carlisle) | Price, Henry (Lewisham, W.) |
| Craddock, Beresford (Spelthorne) | Johnson, Eric (Blackley) | Prior-Palmer, Brig. O. L. |
| Crosthwaite-Eyre, Col. O. E. | Joseph, Sir Keith | Raikes, Sir Victor |
| Crowder, Sir John (Finchley) | Joynson-Hicks, Hon. Sir Lancelot | Rawlinson, Peter |
| Crowder, Petre (Ruislip-Northwood) | Kaberry, D. | Redmayne, M. |
| Cunningham, Knox | Keegan, D. | Rees-Davies, W. R. |
| Currie, C. B. H. | Kerr, H. W. | Remnant, Hon. P. |
| Dance, J. C. G. | Kimball, M. | Renton, D. L. M. |
| D'Avigdor-Goldsmid, Sir Henry | Lagden, G. W. | Rippon, A. G. F. |
| Deedes, W. F. | Lambert, Hon. G. | Robertson, Sir David |
| Digby, Simon Wingfield | Lambton, Viscount | Robinson, Sir Roland (Blackpool, S.) |
| Donaldson, Cmdr. C. E. McA. | Leather, E. H. C. | Rodgers, John (Sevenoaks) |
| Doughty, C. J. A. | Leavey, J. A. | Roper, Sir Harold |
| du Cann, E. D. L. | Leburn, W. G. | Ropner, Col. Sir Leonard |
| Duncan, Capt. J. A. L. | Legge-Bourke, Maj. E. A. H. | Russell, R. S. |
| Duthie, W. S. | Legh, Hon. Peter (Petersfield) | Schofield, Lt.-Col. W. |
| Eden, J. B. (Bournemouth, West) | Lindsay, Hon. James (Devon, N.) | Scott-Miller, Cmdr. R, |
| Emmet, Hon. Mrs. Evelyn | Lloyd, Maj. Sir Guy (Renfrew, E.) | Shepherd, William |
| Errington, Sir Eric | Longden, Gilbert | Simon, J. E. S. (Middlesbrough, W.) |
| Farey-Jones, F. W. | Low, Rt. Hon. A. R. W. | Smithers, Peter (Winchester) |
| Fell, A. | Lucas, Sir Jocelyn (Portsmouth, S.) | Soames, Capt. c. |
| Finlay, Graeme | Lucas, P. B. (Brentford & Chiswick) | Spearman, Sir Alexander |
| Speir, R. M. | Thompson, Lt.-Cdr. R. (Croydon, S.) | Ward, Dame Irene (Tynemouth) |
| Stevens, Geoffrey | Thorneycroft, Rt. Hon. P. | Waterhouse, Capt. Rt. Hon. C. |
| Steward, Harold (Stockport, S.) | Thornton-Kemsley, C. N. | Watkinson, Rt. Hon. Harold |
| Stewart, Henderson (Fife, E.) | Tiley, A. (Bradford, W.) | Whitelaw, W.S.I.(Penrith & Border) |
| Stoddart-Scott, Col. M. | Tilney, John (Wavertree) | Williams, Paul (Sunderland, S.) |
| Storey, S. | Turner, H. F. L. | Wills, C. (Bridgwater) |
| Studholme, sir Henry | Vane, W. M. F. | Wilson, Geoffrey (Truro) |
| Summers, Sir Spencer | Vaughan-Morgan, J. K. | Wood, Hon. R. |
| Sumner, W. D. M. (Orpington) | Vickers, Miss J. H. | Woollam, John Victor |
| Taylor, Sir Charles (Eastbourne) | Vosper, Rt. Hon. D. F. | Yates, William (The Wrekin) |
| Temple, J. M. | Wakefield, Sir Wavell (St. M'lebone) | |
| Thomas, P. J. M. (Conway) | Wall, Major Patrick | TELLERS FOR THE NOES: |
| Thompson, Kenneth (Walton) | Ward, Rt. Hon. C. R. (Worcester) | Mr. Wakefield and Mr. Barber. |