§
'(1) As soon as he is satisfied that a system of tape-recording of interviews by police officers with prisoners held in custody at police stations is available that is mechanically efficient and workable, the Secretary of State—
(2) Such regulations shall provide inter alia that:
§ Brought up, and read the First time.
§ Mr. Eldon GriffithsI beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.
Mr. Deputy SpeakerWith this we may take new clause 20—Tape-recording (2)—
- (a) The Secretary of State shall make regulations to provide for the tape-recording of interviews by police officers with prisoners held in custody at police stations where prisoners are detained.
- (b) Such regulations shall provide inter alia that:
- (i) the whole of the interview shall be tape-recorded and this includes arty questioning cautioning or the taking of any statement whether written by the person or the police officer and any conversation between a police officer and the person preliminary to or consequent on such questioning, cautioning or taking of a statement;
- (ii) the interviews to be tape-recorded shall be those where the person interviewed is reasonably suspected of an offence which is triable on indictment, either way, or one of such offences triable summarily as the regulations shall provide;
- (iii) If an interview may not be tape-recorded because of mechanical failure or because of a suitable interviewing room not being available, the interview should be postponed until such time as the failure has been rectified or room becomes available unless an officer of the rank of at least Chief Inspector not connected with the investigation believes on reasonable grounds that such delay would be impracticable. It shall be the duty of the officer concerned to record the reason for the interview not being tape-recorded;
- (iv) the standard of tapes and recording machines shall include specifications to minimise the risk of interference with a tape;
- (v) one unedited copy of every tape-recording shall be made to be kept, secured and played only by order of a court;
- (vi) the defence shall have access to a copy of an unedited tape on request as of right;
307 - (vii) at the commencement of any interview the date, time and place will be recorded;
- (viii) forms of recording interviews other than by tape-recording shall not be rendered inadmissible.
- (ix) it shall be an offence for any person, including any police officer or other person charged with the duty of investigation of offences or charging offenders to interfere with the recording of interviews as provided by this section, or to erase, alter, amend, cut, tamper with in any way or destroy any tape-recording of an interview made under the provisions of (v) above.
- (x) "tape-recording" shall include any process for the recording of sound by magnetic tape in a form suitable for reproduction or other process and may additionally include visual recording.'.
§ Mr. GriffithsWe now come to an important discussion on the need for tape recording. I note with interest that a number of Opposition Members have added their names to my new clause.
The new clause owes a great deal to a remarkable new collaboration that arose during the study of the Bill between the Police Federation and the Law Society. It has the support of both and you may agree, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that that is an unusual but powerful combination.
§ Mr. Andrew F. BennettNew clause 20 is grouped with new clause 19. It has been suggested to some hon. Members that it is new clause 20 that has the Law Society's support and there is a slight difference between the two. Will the hon. Gentleman explain that to us?
§ Mr. GriffithsYes, I shall come to that, but I am saying at the outset that the new clause has two parents—the Police Federation and the Law Society. The Law Society has done the drafting, and perhaps that is just as well.
Tape recording has been debated for years and it is only fair to say that the police service has neverbeen enthusiastic about it. There are many elements within the police service—perhaps in the Association of Chief Police Officers and elsewhere.— who remain less than keen about it. I must freely admit that over the years I, too, have had doubts about it. They arose primarily because I could not easily see how one could overcome two problems.
The first problem was that interrogations are bound to take a long time. A police officer, particularly if he is interrogating a young person, will try hard in the early stages to win his confidence. He will talk about virtually everything under the sun, from football matches to film stars, in order to establish a rapport. I have often thought that it would be difficult to ask a jury to listen to the whole of such a recording, because a large proportion of the tape would be extraneous to the matter under consideration. It seemed to me that there would inevitably have to be some severe editing, which immediately raises the question of who would do it. That was my first difficulty — the sheer scale and therefore the cost of tape-recording interviews that frequently last for many hours.
My second difficulty was that from time to time during the course of an interrogation, particularly that of an old lag who had gone through it all before, he would deliberately blurt out some appalling charge or language about other people who had nothing to do with the case that was being considered. For example, he might allege that some innocent third party was guilty of a foul assault. That would raise the question how the police could permit such a recording to be brought before a jury when it plainly 308 contained libellous, scandalous or injurious matter concerning a third party. Again one faced the problem of editing, and my difficulty was to know how that could be done.
I am glad to say that after much discussion I can now see the way forward. It has largely been described in the full answer that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary gave the other day to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton (Mr. Lawrence). It would be wrong of me to quote this in detail, but there are three things that I want to welcome.
First, it is now proposed that the defence as well as the prosecution—the police for the time being—will be able to examine the tape before the trial and arrive at some sensible judgment on what part of the material should be placed before the court. That is a perfectly sensible arrangement, and it was well described by my right hon. Friend, who said:
it will be recommended that notwithstanding the lack of formal arrangements for advanced disclosure of the prosecution case in certain circumstances the defence has served on it in advance the police officer's statement of evidence.That is an interesting new departure. I should be grateful for my hon. and learned Friend's comments.The second problem was the cost of transcription. Typists are expensive and the many hundreds of thousands, even millions, of words that would be taped would cost an enomous sum if they were all to be solemnly typed up. My right hon. Friend, in his reply to my hon. and learned Friend the Member for Burton, had it about right when he said:
Where, however, there is a need for a transcript, provision will be made for prior consideration by the courts and the legal aid committees of the justification for making a transcript so that the party ordering the transcript does not run the risk of having the considerable expense involved disallowed on taxation.—[Official Report, 29 April 1983; Vol. 41, c. 455.]That is another important, practical step forward.I have two other points, one of detail and one of general principle. I am glad that progress has been made in identifying the type of equipment and in setting up proper research and monitoring proposals. We are still at an experimental stage, but there are to be thorough experiments in four police areas, which have already been defined, and possibly a further one in Northumbria. I am glad, too, that Customs and Excise will also be mounting two field trials in tape recording at London airport. It is particularly gratifying that two of the areas are in the Metropolitan police area, one in the north, one in the midlands, in Leicester, and one in the important southern force in Hampshire. I hope that my hon. and learned Friend will be able to tell the House that the Home Office is determined to move forward rapidly with these experiments. I hope, too, that British industry, which has the opportunity to produce these unobtrusive, robust and reliable machines which can be operated simply will do so quickly, because there is a potential export market in this growing business.
We are still at a stage of advanced experiment, but the important thing is that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, on behalf of the Government, seems now to have accepted fully the principle of tape recording and has virtually adopted it as a policy that will be worked through as rapidly as possible. I am glad that we are to have proper monitoring.
I end with this possibly daring prediction. The reservations that I and the police service have had will melt 309 away over the next year or so as we see the results of the experiments. In two or three years' time we shall have in many, although not all, police stations, these simple, reliable machines, and they will achieve two things. First, they will enable the police to be protected from unfair allegations. Secondly, the subject will be better protected, too, and the entire process of criminal justice will be conducted more expeditiously.
This is a conversion for me. But it is also a matter of congratulation for the Government. My right hon. Friend has moved a long way along this course, although it has not always been easy for him to do so.
§ Mr. Donald Dewar (Glasgow, Garscadden)This is a somewhat alien intrusion into this part of the Bill, but when we come to other clauses relating specifically to Scotland, as well as to England and Wales, more will be heard from Scottish Members. However, it might be useful to make an intervention in this general discussion on tape recording, because we in Scotland, having gone through these arguments in the past few years, have some experience that might he of help in this debate. In passing, I point out that there is a tendency for hon. and learned Gentlemen who take part in English legal debates to look for comparable experience in almost every quarter of the globe but Scotland, which is part of the United Kingdom.
In my previous appearance in this House in the 1966–70 Parliament we had discussions about majority verdicts. I sat for many a long and weary hour listening to interesting accounts of the experiences of majority verdicts in almost every country of which I had heard—indeed, of some that I had not—but no one mentioned that Scotland had had majority verdicts for hundreds of years.
9.30 pm
When my eye alighted on this legislation and these admirable new clauses—incidentally, it is refreshing to be on the same side of the argument as the hon. Member for Bury St. Edmunds (Mr. Griffiths); it is an unusual event when discussing legislation on this or any other matter—I thought that I should say a word or two about why I think positive progress should be made in every part of the United Kingdom, both north and south of the border. I am particularly glad to see that the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland, the hon. Member for Renfrewshire, East (Mr. Stewart), who has responsibility for these matters, has miraculously appeared from behind your Chair, Mr. Deputy Speaker.
It would be unfair to rehearse at length the arguments for tape recording, because I am sure that they must have been gone into in minute detail in Committee. I agree with the hon. Member for Bury St. Edmunds that tape recording is an essential and important safeguard for the rights of the individual who is at hazard with the law—the person who finds himself detained in Scotland in a police station under section 2 of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act and in England under the equivalent procedures that exist south of the border and for the police themselves.
Perhaps I should make a confession. Indeed, perhaps I should declare an interest. I am a solicitor by trade, although I seldom practise my trade nowadays, and I earned my bread and butter in the criminal courts in a very jogging practice. Therefore, I have experience of listening to gentlemen in trouble with the law reacting in a variety of ways to that situation.
There is no doubt that some of the reflex defences are, "It was planted," "I was verballed," "It is all lies," "They 310 made it up". Indeed, a great deal of court time, and the time of the judicial system, is spent in sifting through those defences, which often turn out to be false but obviously have to be taken seriously. Because the evidence is very much "them and us"—the accused says that he has been set up and that words have been put into his mouth, and the policeman obviously has a vested interest to ensure that that is not seen to be so—it is difficult for the court to be 100 per cent. certain in every case that it has come down on the right side of the argument. If I might use an analogy from the trade, it is like the situation that faces the most junior magistrate when he comes across his first "two cop breach". At the end of the day there are no independent witnesses; it is a simple matter of credibility.
I freely concede that in many cases this defence is clearly fabricated, but everyone who has practised in criminal courts over a lengthy period—I am sure that this is true of Ministers as well as of Opposition spokesmen —is left occasionally with the unpleasant thought that perhaps someone was speaking the truth although the decision went the other way. Therefore, this is an important safeguard not only for the accused, but for the police, because it will preserve them from the false allegation.
I look with some trepidation at what is now happening in London, because I do not pretend to have the detailed knowledge of many of my right hon. and hon. Friends about what happens in England. As I understand it—perhaps it is a case of looking for a specific statutory enactment at this stage—the arguments about tape recording have been knocking around, if I may put it that way, since 1971, when they cropped up in the Criminal Law Revision Committee report. There has been a great deal of argument and much lack of action in England ever since.
I welcome the Solicitor-General for Scotland to the debate. He may remember that on Second Reading of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Bill 1980 on 14 April 1980 there was a speech from the hon. and learned Member for Darwen (Sir C. Fletcher-Cooke). It was unusual for him to speak in a Scottish law debate and he made rather an uncharacteristic speech. He announced rather dramatically that he would not be able to join his Government colleagues in support of the Bill because he had been incensed by the fact that the introduction of tape recording had been discussed year after year. He saw it as an absolutely essential safeguard but precisely damn all had happened.
The hon. and learned Member for Darwen used the Second Reading of that Bill to protest. I cannot remember whether he voted with the Opposition or abstained, but it was a strong and forceful way of drawing my attention —I do not know whether it drew anyone else's—to the rather dilatory record of successive Governments on tape recording. I accept that it applies to successive Governments.
The hon. and learned Member for Darwen said:
There is no doubt, from the arguments used from time to time against the taping and recording of questioning by the police, that the arguments are so derisory as to question the sincerity of those who put them."—[Official Report, 14 April 1980; c. 861.]He said that, despite that strong feeling, nothing had happened and he therefore found himself at odds with his 311 Ministers about a major change in legal legislation. I will not call it law reform, because that might suggest that I look upon it with some sympathy.We have had discussions about this subject since early in the 1970s. The theoretical argument has been won, but little has flowed from it. If we leave the Bill without placing a duty upon the Government to act, we may well be leaving the subject in exactly the same unsatisfactory state.
The Minister may say, "We are going to have some experiments in England. Once experiments are set up there is a certain momentum and dynamism and at the end of the day there is bound to be success and action." We of course made this mistake in Scotland, because we had a series of experiments with the tape recording of the interrogation of suspects who were detained under section 2 of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act 1980.
That was an important departure from the law in Scotland. It was the first time that the police had been given power to detain a citizen when they did not have sufficient evidence to arrest him. It was a departure at which many of us looked sceptically. We felt that the departure was the result of arguments of expediency put forward, somewhat shamefacedly, by the Solicitor-General for Scotland, the hon. and learned Member for South Angus (Mr. Fraser). It was argued that there were many abuses of the law and that therefore the law should be brought into line with the abuses rather than tackle the abuses. As a concomitant to that departure in the law, it was accepted that we should have the experiments in tape recording. It was an important part of the package that had come out of the Thomson report on criminal procedure in Scotland, which was the foundation of the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Act.
It was strongly frowned upon by Ministers, but the Thomson report advocated the detention power which I have been implicitly criticising. Thomson said that if that power were to be given there had to be a safeguard and the quid pro quo was the introduction of tape recording. I refer merely to paragraph 7.13(c). It is a simple principle, so I will give just a tast of what the report says. I do not think that we need to go into the case of Chalmers v. Her Majesty's Advocate and its place in the development in Scots law, unless a Scottish Minister wishes to go into the matter more deeply later in the debate.
Lord Thomson said:
Interrogation of suspects in police stations must be recorded on tape".I shall not follow the argument through to paragraph 7.21. The main point is that it was clearly a package deal. An infringement of traditional individual liberty was to be permitted because it was expedient to make police investigations more effective and perhaps to increase the clear-up rate for serious crime, but if that was done there must be tape recording.In Committee and on Report we tried hard to amend the Criminal Justice (Scotland) Bill, with some Conservative Back Bench support, but we were unsuccessful and achieved only what is now being offered in England—experiments. I wished to bring that discouraging point to the notice of the hon. Member for Bury St. Edmunds and others.
The experiments began in Falkirk and Dundee and were later extended to Glasgow and Aberdeen. They have gone 312 on endlessly, clouded in anonymity and shrouded in secrecy. They are quite properly being monitored extremely carefully. I asked a parliamentary question about the matter because, as so often happens, there were leaks in the press. We know that the Scottish Home and Health Department had a report, "The First 24 Months" —a title which emphasised the length of time for which the experiments had continued. The first two years of the Falkirk and Dundee experiments were carefully analysed in that report. We owe that information to press leaks. The report was never published or made available to Members of Parliament.
On 7 December 1982, in reply to my parliamentary question as to whether the report would be published, I was told:
No. This is an interim internal report on the experimental tape recording of police interviews in Scotland. To publish it would jeopardise the free and frank exchanges upon which the success of the experiment depends. In view of recent press reports I should make it clear that in these exchanges, and at all stages of the experiment we have had the full and ready cooperation of the police."—(Official Report, 7 December 1982; Vol. 33, c. 465.]As we all know, when a Minister feels the need to put such a disclaimer at the end of a reply, there is good reason to suppose that there has not been full and frank co-operation. I do not know whether that was so on that occasion, but articles in the New Statesman and The Scotsman suggested that there had been some interesting distortions of experience as a result of the introduction of the experiment.I see the Solicitor-General for Scotland shake his head, and I sympathise. I may be under a misapprehension, but if I am it is his fault because he will not publish the report. If he would publish it, I should not need to speculate because I should know what happened in the first two years' experience of tape recording experiments in Scotland and we could have an informed debate on the matter. Whether my opinion would be greatly improved, I do not know, but the debate would certainly be better informed. My difficulty stems from the fact that I do not know exactly what has been happening and that is entirely due to the Government's coyness about producing the evidence, which we all know exists and which has been half leaked and has appeared in shadowy form in public print.
§ Mr. Christopher PriceDoes my hon. Friend agree that the most dramatic element in what I believe was a wholly authentic leak in the New Statesman was the way in which the length of the interview was cut down when tape recording was introduced? Does he agree that it cannot be a bad thing if, instead of spending many hours trying to get confessions out of people, the police cut down interview time substantially?
§ Mr. DewarI congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, West (Mr. Price) on his excellent powers of recall on what must have been for him a rather peripheral matter, which related to occurrences in Scotland and to the Scottish legal system. My hon. Friend is extremely accurate in his recollections.
I will quote from a press report, in the New Statesman, dated 26 November 1982, as hon. Members have not seen the actual report: 313
In Dundee, before tape-recording, the average length of an interrogation was 24.5 minutes. Since tape-recording, it has fallen to 10 minutes. In Falkirk the reduction is even more dramatic: from 39 minutes to a mere six minutes.Those are interesting facts and figures. It is a great pity that more is not known about the subject. Although other matters were considered, such as the number of statements that were made before suspects reached the police station, which gave rise to some speculation about the level of co-operation and the frankness of the way in which the system worked, I encourage the House to consider a statutory obligation towards tape recording. I quote from the same article:The response of agencies other than the police to the experiment is by and large positive. A survey of the prosecution service showed that in almost half of all cases the taped material is regarded as important; and in one in seven cases it was described as crucial or very important. It was widely thought that tape recording had reduced the number of false allegations against the police.That is an important part of the document.I trust that I will not be returning to full-time legal practice in the immediate future, but I am well aware that one of the most aggravating positions that a defence solicitor can find himself in is when he is faced with what he suspects to be a false defence and he is unable to persuade his client that it is counter-productive in the context of the trial. He clearly has a duty not to be judge and jury, but if that is the defence his client wishes to put forward it is for the court to decide whether it is valid or not, although he may appreciate that he is going through a charade which is no good to anyone. If a tape recording was available, the lawyer could say to his client, "Look, mate, let's play the tape over and listen to it. What on earth will you say when you go into the witness box, in view of what we can hear on the tape?" The saving in judicial time and the irritation which many people face when they are on jury service—they sometimes have to sit through a pointless judicial exercise—is a powerful argument for the introduction of tape recordings.
The arguments are overwhelming. In a sense, they have been conceded. Experiments are taking place north and south of the border. Most arguments against tape-recording are practical, such as whether it is necessary to produce the entire tape or whether extracts can be taken from the tape, and matter involving the rules of admissibility. With a little will and ingenuity, the obstacles can be overcome. When examining the English experience from 1971—I am principally considering the Scottish position, as I understand it far better—one sees that an enormous inertia is built into the system. The problem cannot be left to the leisurely programme of endless experiments. We should be putting some impetus behind the problem.
The new clauses provide a real chance to do exactly that. The new clauses should be given a fair wind unless the Goverment can give far better assurances.
§ Mr. LawrenceA sad irony is that those hon. Members who speak most strongly in support of new clauses 19 and 20—the introduction of tape-recording—spend the most time trying to stop the Bill getting on to the statute book. I want clauses dealing with tape-recording to be included in this measure.
I cannot avoid the opportunity of speaking on this subject, because I have spoken more about tape recording since I have been a Member of Parliament than about any other aspect of law reform. I have spoken more often on 314 the subject of law reform than on fluoridation, which will give hon. Members an idea of how often I have spoken about tape recording.
I am pleased that some advance appears to be taking place. The clear recommendations made in the early 1970s degenerated into feasibility studies about the feasibility of whether it was feasible to have a feasibility study. Fortunately, a Conservative Government took office in 1979 and action was taken in various parts of Britain. Field trials are far advanced. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary's parliamentary answer to me last week, which was full and thorough, is proof positive that the Government are determined to do something. However, I hope that my hon. and learned Friend the Minister can tell me how long he expects the field trials will last. Can he give us a date for their conclusion?
I do not deny the need for these matters to be investigated thoroughly. If they are not, when the scheme is introduced it will be ineffective. However, I want some commitment about the dates and a more positive sign of determination than we have had hitherto. I know that I am pushing at an open door, because if I have spoken long and loud about tape recorders, my hon. and learned Friend the Minister spoke even longer and louder before he reached the elevated office that he has attained.
My hon. and learned Friend and I were both practitioners in the criminal courts. We know that it is vital, for all sorts of reasons, that tape recording should be introduced. The allegation of an admission known as "the verbal", whether it is a false allegation by the police or by the accused, has been responsible for more miscarriages of justice—I mean not convictions of the innocent, but acquittals of the guilty—and more delays in our criminal processes than almost any other aspect of our criminal trials.
I wish to list some of the benefits that will accrue from tape-recorded interviews. First, they will shorten trials and, therefore, speed up justice. The long queue of criminal trials will shift through the system faster. There will be fairer justice, because witnesses will not have forgotten their evidence. The cost of delay, which is enormous, will be substantially reduced if there is a great turnover. Therefore, questions of the cost implications of introducing tape recordings are peripheral and almost unimportant. We could almost put a video tape recorder in every police station in the country and still save many millions of pounds each year.
Secondly, they will lead to the conviction of more who are guilty. As one who has spent a large part of his life defending people in the criminal courts, I can say that it is an undisputed view of the criminal bar that many people plead not guilty because they stand a chance of being acquitted if the only evidence against them is verbal. That is certainly the position in the courts in London. It is bad for justice. If there were no dispute about the admission of guilt, many more people who now plead not guilty, and are acquitted, would face their responsibilities at an earlier stage and plead guilty. More justice to society would result from that.
Thirdly, there is the protection of the innocent. An important facet of introducing tape-recorded interviews is that the innocent are thereby protected from false allegations of admissions of guilt that sometimes, though not often, result in convictions. That is an important reason why tape recordings should be introduced.
315 Fourthly, they would massively increase the morale of the police. Consider how many detectives in some of the major cities time and again in the witness box are accused of being liars, cheats, planters and perjurers. It must be wearying and demoralising for police officers. If all that were cut out, and all the temptation of the verbal removed, the self regard, efficiency and pride of the police force would be greatly increased.
§ Mr. SnapeHas the hon. and learned Gentleman ever made such allegations in defending any of his clients?
§ Mr. LawrenceIf the hon. Gentleman had been listening to this statement and my earlier speeches he would know that one of the things that I am complaining about is the need to be for ever cross-examining police officers and suggesting that they are dishonest, when in many cases the whole matter could be settled if there were tape-recordings.
I congratulate not only my right hon. Friend and the Government on taking these steps, but the steering committees and the committees that have been thinking about these field trials. The chief constables of the various police forces throughout Britain who are implementing them, and the Police Federation. I have a feeling that the impetus for much of this came only when the Police Federation withdrew its objections to tape-recorded interviews. When the Police Federation said it was prepared to go ahead and support the trials, there was a completely new drive on these matters.
There is some action pending. I hope that this will not just grind away into the dust as so many other good proposals have in the past. I hope, in particular, that these new clauses will be added to the Bill and that Opposition members will do all they can to speed this Bill to the statute book so that it can be said that the Labour party and the Liberals have contributed to introducing a substantial and vital piece of law reform which will do more than almost anything else could for the reduction of crime and the perpetuation of justice in our criminal system.
§ Mr. PittI could not echo more warmly the closing words of the hon. and learned Member for Burton (Mr. Lawrence). In rising to support this new clause to which I have put my name I must say that I believe that the introduction of tape recording is one of the major safeguards of civil liberties, which to a great extent this Bill lacks. That is one of the reasons why I and my right hon. and hon. Friends in the Social Democratic and Liberal parties have been opposing it. If the Government can see their way to accepting new clause 19, they will be taking a positive step in aiding the police service, improving the morale of the police and safeguarding civil liberties. It will without doubt put an end to the verbal. With modern tape recording methods and equipment, the verbal cannot exist if tape-recorded evidence becomes wholly admissible.
§ Mr. Christopher PriceDoes the hon. Gentleman not think that one has to be a bit cautious about this? Does he remember that in the New Cross inquest, although there was an independent person present during much of the questioning of the young people and the taking of statements from them, during some of the questioning there was not? There was a good deal of evidence there 316 that, if there is a period during which there is no tape recording, especially if an individual has previous convictions or there are ways in which the police can put pressure on him, the tape-recorded statements can compound the injustice. If there is going to be any tape recording at all, it must be tape recording of every part of the interview between the police and the individual.
§ Mr. PittI could not agree more with the hon. Gentleman. New clause 19(2)(iii) says:
if an interview may not be tape-recorded because of mechanical failure or because of a suitable interviewing room not being available, the interview should be postponed"—;and it continues to define the position. It also says that one totally unedited tape recording shall be available to the defence. I hope that that will reassure the hon. Gentleman.I know something about the editing of magnetic tapes, having spent a good deal of my time over the years editing for various purposes as an amateur. At one time I could understand the objections that were raised to the recording of evidence on tape. It was easy to edit on reel-to-reel machinery and it was difficult to discover that editing had taken place. With modern lightweight cassette equipment that objection is 99 per cent. obviated, and we should have confidence in the modern equipment.
It has been proposed that two districts covered by the Metropolitan police—Holborn and Croydon—should be involved in the experimental tape recording of evidence. Those two districts will provide a good cross-section of those whom the Metropolitan police are likely to interview. Holborn is a central city area—
§ It being Ten o'clock, the debate stood adjourned.