Sentencing (Pre-Consolidation Amendments) Bill — House of Commons, 2020-06-04
Topic: Law and Crime
Chris Ian Brian Mynott Philp (Conservative, Centre-right): The Bill seeks to pave the way for the consolidation of sentencing procedural law in the forthcoming sentencing code. Currently, when passing sentence, a sentencing judge must consider the sentencing law that was applicable at the time of the offence. Given the number of different pieces of sentencing legislation passed over the years, that is often a complicated exercise. When reviewing that area, the Law Commission discovered 1,300 pages of legislation governing sentencing in this country. When it conducted a review in 2012, it discovered that errors were made in sentencing in 36% of cases, we think as a consequence of the extraordinary complexity of having to work out which piece of sentencing law applied at the time of the offence. Therefore, given the concept behind the sentencing code and its essential precursor, the Bill will ensure that a single set of sentencing legislation is applicable at the time of sentence, to which sentencing judges may refer The Law Commission was asked to look at this issue in September 2014. After Herculean labours it reported back in late 2018, but as a consequence of various general elections and other constitutional disruption, only in 2020 do we finally enact this Bill. I put on record my thanks to the Law Commissioners for their work, and particularly Professor David Ormerod, QC, for the enormous amount of work he has done in preparing the sentencing code for which this Bill paves the way As I understand it there are no amendments to the Bill’s five clauses, but I will briefly speak to each clause—I will be extremely concise. There are two substantive clauses. Clause 1(3) contains a clean sweep provision that removes those historical layers of sentencing law legislation to which I referred, so that when the sentencing code is enacted, which will be soon, sentencing courts will no longer need to refer to the historical versions of sentencing law in place at the time of the offence, and can instead refer to the sentencing code that was in force at the time of sentence. We are, of course, extremely mindful of the well-established common law right that no offender should be subject to a heavier penalty at the point of sentence than was in force at the time of the offence. That right is enshrined in article 7 of the European convention on human rights, but the common law right long predates that. Therefore, in recognition of that important principle, there are a series of exemptions to ensure that no offender will suffer a heavier penalty than would otherwise have been the case. Those are expressed in clause 1(4) and (5), and in a wider list of exemptions enumerated in schedule 1 Clause 2, the second substantive clause, essentially makes a series of amendments and modifications to existing sentencing legislation. Those are enumerated in schedule 2, which is quite long, and they essentially correct minor errors, streamlining sentencing procedural law. For example, they change language to avoid inconsistency and update statutory references. Because any consolidation must operate on the current law, we need to make those changes to enable the consolidation to happen in a technically correct way. They are therefore all essentially technical amendments to ensure that legislation works in the way that is intended I stress that the provisions of neither clause 1 nor clause 2 make any substantive changes to sentencing law. They do not increase or reduce the penalties for any particular offence; they simply clarify the way that sentencing law is available to judges to use when they pass sentence. It is a procedural simplification. Nothing in the Bill changes the actual level of sentences that are available to the courts to pass down Clause 3 is a technical interpretation clause, clarifying what is meant by the various definitions and phrases used in the Bill. Clause 4 provides regulation-making powers in the Bill, if any changes need to be made that are necessary for the implementation of the sentencing code and for no other purpose. Any such statutory instruments would be made by the affirmative procedure Finally, clause 5 sets out the commencement provisions. Although, of course, the regulation-making powers will have effect upon gaining Royal Assent, the wider force of the Bill takes effect only when the sentencing code has been passed. The sentencing Bill enacting the code will be before the House relatively shortly I do not wish to detain the Committee any longer discussing clauses to which no amendments have been tabled, but I hope that gives the Committee a flavour of the clauses’ operative effect. This is a piece of extremely important legislation that I think the entire legal community will strongly welcome. It is a shame that it could not have been introduced any earlier, but we are doing so today, and it will greatly improve the operation of criminal sentencing in this jurisdiction. I urge the Committee to agree that clauses 1 to 5 stand part of the Bill.