HC Deb 02 December 2002 vol 395 c590W
Mr. Malins

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will make a statement on the changes his proposals for revealing previous convictions to a jury will make to the law on similar fact evidence. [82084]

Hilary Benn

The Government proposes to place the admissibility of evidence of previous misconduct on a statutory basis in a Criminal Justice Bill, which was introduced in Parliament on 21 November. Our proposals will ensure that all evidence of bad character, including previous convictions, is admissible where it is relevant to a matter at issue in a trial. This will represent a fundamental change to the current law on previous misconduct, including the similar fact rule. There will be a discretion to exclude evidence of bad character if its prejudicial effect exceeds its probative value. However, the proposed scheme will create a clearly inclusionary approach under which relevant bad character evidence will not be excluded unless the court is satisfied that there is good reason to do so.

Our proposals will also offer new protection to witnesses, to guard against unnecessarily wide ranging and humiliating attacks on their character. The current rules offer no such protection.

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