Speeding up the Preliminary Enquiry
| Published date | 01 January 1948 |
| Date | 01 January 1948 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/002201834801200107 |
| Subject Matter | Article |
Speeding
up the Preliminary Enquiry
THE preliminary examination of indictable offences
has
recently come under severe fire. Lord Goddard
had
some strong criticisms to make of
it
at
the
last annual
meeting of
the
Magistrates' Association,
and
Mr.
John
Maude in a
letter
to The Times calls it a "long standing
nuisance".
"The
volume of criminal work
throughout
this
country
day
by
day",
he wrote, "is quite enormous,
and
many
of
the
cases entail
the
taking
of written depositions of
the
evidence
against those who are destined for
trial
by
jury.
It
cannot
be pointed
out
too strongly
that
this entails a
vast
and
shocking waste of
time
to
thousands
of witnesses,
and
thus
waste of time
to
the
country. Witnesses are
kept
hanging
about, hour after hour,
and
not
infrequently
day
after day,
who should be
at
their proper work,
and
now is
the
time
when
the
grim necessities demand
that
radical reforms
should be introduced. There is, in
my
opinion, no reason
that
can
prevail against these long-needed reforms, and I
have
not
the
slightest
doubt
that
justice
can
still be done,
and
seen
to
be done, without all
the
present
antiquated
procedure."
Some of our readers will
think
Mr. Maude has
put
the
case against
the
preliminary examination alittle toostrongly
and
they
would have liked to know just
what
reforms he
would recommend. No
doubt
during his career he has
sat
many
times through such an enquiry
and
chafed
at
the
delay entailed by
the
clerk setting down
the
evidence in
legible long hand.
It
has been said
that
there is no dif-
ference between
the
longevity of bachelors
and
married
men
but
that
to married men life seems longer. Possibly,
in
the
same way,
the
taking
of depositions has seemed longer
to
Mr. Maude
than
it really is.
Consider
the
facts. To begin with, comparatively few
indictable charges are committed for trial
at
all now, 88 per
cent. being dealt with by
the
magistrates
and
only twelve
92
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