Evidence Law in UK Law

Throughout the web of the English Criminal Law one golden thread is always to be seen that it is the duty of the prosecution to prove the prisoner's guilt subject to what I have already said as to the defence of insanity and subject also to any statutory exception.

The test must be—is the evidence capable of tending to persuade a reasonable jury of the accused's guilt on some ground other than his bad character and disposition to commit the sort of crime with which he is charged? The similarity would have to be so unique or striking that common sense makes it inexplicable on the basis of coincidence.

First, there must have been a mistake as to an existing fact, including a mistake as to the availability of evidence on a particular matter. Secondly, the fact or evidence must have been "established", in the sense that it was uncontentious and objectively verifiable. Fourthly, the mistake must have played a material (not necessarily decisive) part in the Tribunal's reasoning.

I shall deal first with question (2) which is most important and is decisive, since it is clear law, scarcely needing any express authority, that a judgment must be set aside and declared a nullity by the Court in the exercise of its inherent jurisdiction if and as soon as it appears to the Court that the person named as the judgment debtor was at all material times at the date of writ and subsequently non-existent: such a case is a fortiori than the case which Lord Parker referred to in Daimler Co. v. Continental Tyre Co.

I have never taken a narrow view of the functions of this House as an appellate tribunal. The common law must be developed to meet changing economic conditions and habits of thought, and I would not be deterred by expressions of opinion in this House in old cases. If we are to extend the law it must be by the development and application of fundamental principles. We cannot introduce arbitrary conditions or limitations: that must be left to legislation.

Evidence is relevant if it is logically probative or disprobative of some matter which requires proof. It is sufficient to say, even at the risk of etymological tautology, that relevant (i.e., logically probative or disprobative) evidence is evidence which makes the matter which requires proof more or less probable. Evidence is admissible if it may be lawfully adduced at a trial.

This would have offended against one of the most deeply rooted and jealously guarded principles of our criminal law, which, as stated in Makin v. Attorney-General for New South Wales [ 1894 A.C. 57] is that "it is undoubtedly not competent for "the prosecution to adduce evidence tending to show that the accused has been guilty of criminal acts other than those covered by the indictment for the purpose of leading to the conclusion that the accused is a person likely from his conduct or character to have committed the offence for which he is being tried."