Privileges and Conduct — House of Lords, 2018-11-15
Topic: Civil Rights
Harry Kenneth Woolf (Crossbench, Unknown): I have listened to the speeches that have already been made, and I start off by declaring my interest. I am afraid that, in relation to issues before us, I have more than one interest to declare to the House. The first is that I have known the noble Lord, Lord Lester, for many years, and my family and his family are friends. I emphasise that I am not acting on his behalf; I was never approached to act on his behalf in submitting to this House my view on the issues before us. Secondly, I emphasise my professional career as it appears in the register, which I do not need to elaborate on because I know it is before the House and, I respectfully say, speaks for itself I should disclose that I have conducted a number of investigations. I have been fortunate in that I have been entrusted by Governments, not only in this country but in others, to conduct those investigations and advise. I disclose that I am the editor of one of the leading textbooks, now in its eighth edition, which deals fully with the question of natural justice. I refer to that because natural justice is central to the issues before us. Although the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Eames, is absolutely right about the problems of getting involved with court procedures—to use a euphemism for what he was seeking to describe—the fact is that whether you are deterred by that or anything else, anyone whose life’s work and reputation, acquired during his working life, are challenged is entitled to natural justice as a minimum, basic element of any form of investigation. Knowing what natural justice is, and being conscious that we are at the 20th anniversary of the Human Rights Act, I emphasise that that is particularly important when a person is put in a position such as that of the noble Lord, Lord Lester. The word adversarial is one that nearly always involves cross-examination. But the word inquisitorial does not mean that you cannot have cross-examination. That is contrary to the sense of the word, and the ignorance about that is very worrying to me. For a time, I was chairman—as the noble and learned Lord, Lord Brown, is now—of the sub-committee which dealt with these matters as they then were. Having done that job for a time, I decided that the provisions were wholly unsuited to the purpose they were meant to cover. I was deeply uncomfortable that they were not fit for purpose, and I made that clear to the authorities of the House. That is based on my experience, to which I made reference With that background, I come to look at the code as it is now. There is nothing that I would object to in it. There is nothing I would object to in many cases—not allowing lawyers to come anywhere near the process—but I emphasise that that is on the basis of looking at the issues that have to be determined and deciding what procedure is appropriate. The ones we are dealing with—what the commission had to deal with and two committees had to consider, as well as the commissioner—were peculiarly difficult to resolve in some cases. They are peculiarly difficult especially when there is a sexual connotation, which is what is complained of here I go back a long way as a judge and barrister, and remember when it was required in common law that when an allegation is made, corroboration is required. In addition, it was the duty of judges to warn a jury that it was dangerous to convict unless there was corroboration. It was also well-established that complaints made at the time are not corroboration. I say that only because—I do not blame the commissioner—the position in law today is much more flexible. A complaint is not corroboration but it is very easy to see it as such, and the commissioner in this case saw it as corroboration. She was saying that because of the complaint, there was no need to investigate other things. She was wrong on that because unfortunately, the common law acknowledged what we have to acknowledge today: that there are sometimes motives for making false allegations in cases involving sexual conduct which disguise the reality of the situation It is all too easy to say that, because a complaint is made, the matter is proved, because you think that the person who gives evidence of the complaint is speaking the truth. They may be, but that does not avoid the need to answer the question whether the person making the complaint is telling the truth when she makes it. This is just the basic experience of lawyers such as myself who have had to try these cases.