IT'S A CAUSE THAT SHOULD
UNITE EVERYONE IN BRITAIN

This is a question that should be above the "let's pretend" battles, the exchange of lurid bombast and the wilful misunderstandings of party politics. It's a cause in which we should all be united.

It is nothing less than the preservation of our legal system, which has grown and developed over the centuries, built on the strong foundation of jury trials and the presumption of innocence.
There is a real danger that our precious rights and liberties may be lost in a vague and haphazard attempt to impose a single system of law on Europe.
If, God forbid, you ever found yourself in trouble with the law, would you like to be kept in jail for an indeterminate period without trial? Would you be happy in a court which didn't presume you innocent?
Would you care to be arrested on the say-so of a Greek or Spanish judge and be packed off, with no case having been made you, to face trial under a foreign system in another country?

If such happenings strike you as being totally improbable, contrary to all our ideas of justice, and our common law, let us consider where the danger lies.

 Last month, the European Parliament resolved that, in a treaty to be signed in France in December, a "European Public Prosecutor's office" should be created to "protect the Union's interest against fraud" and to provide that "the Union could legislate in criminal matters in respect of fraud that damages the interest of the Union".
So anyone could be prosecuted for fraud of Eurpean funds by a mysterious official, with undefined powers, and the European Union could pass criminal laws without reference to our Parliament.
Behind these proposals is an equally mysterious document entitled corpus juris, produced by the EU, to which the public was alerted by a short piece in the Mail almost two years ago.
The corpus juris/dealt briefly with juries. "The courts," it said, "must consist of professional judges specialising in economic and financial matters, and not simple jurors."
Many people, particularly ethnic groups, have been appalled at Jack Straw's attempt to restrict jury trials, preferring to be tried by their peers rather than by a professional panel.
What would they have to say to a system which seeks to abolish juries altogether, or at least in fraud cases? Or indeed for all crimes if it later extended as the basis for a unified European justice system?
European judges, unlike their English counterparts, have been judges throughout their careers. They haven't been both defenders and prosecutors and seen booth sides of the courtroom battle.
They are accustomed to act as inquisitors and not as referees in a balanced argument. But it is suggested that they are to decide our guilt or innocence.
And what about habeas corpus- a right even older than Magna Carta, which entitles any of our citizens arrested to be brought before a court and told what the charges are with a maximum of 60 hours of their detention?
The right of habeas corpusexists in England, America and countries which adopted our legal system: .
You can be kept for along time in a Spanish or Italian prison in the hope that the suspense may force a confession, or that some sort of evidence might turn up. The European Public Prosecutor, the corpus juris suggests, would be able to imprison anyone for up to six months (plus a renewable three months) if he or she believed the alleged suspect was guilty of the vague offence of fraud that damages the interest of the Union.
Polilticians haven't shone in their reactions to this dubious corpus juris. Last year, the Labour Members of the European Parliament followed their leader Pauline Green in "welcoming it in". The Tory MEPs also voted for it, although they later claimed that they had pressed the wrong voting buttons by mistake.

However, by last October, there had been a good deal of criticism of these proposals. The House of Lords had condemned them roundly, and so Jack Straw made a counter-proposal of "mutual recognition of judicial decisions".
The Home Secretary agreed the proposition that British policemen would be able to arrest British citizens on the order of a European judge and send them off to be tried in systems without the writ of habeas corpus,the provisions of Magna Carta or the burden of proof being on the prosecution.
These are the proposals which, it seems, are to be agreed later this year.
Criminal cases are not decided by computer or ingenious mechanical devices; they are conducted by human beings, by judges and juries who are capable, as we all are, of making mistakes, dozing off or surrendering, however unconsciously to deeply-rooted prejudices.
Of course, cases go wrong even in the best-regulated courets.
All that can be done is to provide the best system for the punishment of wrong-dong and the protection of the innocent. And any legal system is capable of imporvement.
If life sentences were no longer mandatory, the ridiculous result of the case of the Norfolk farmer Tony Martine could have been avoided.
The Crown Prosecution Service is, no doubt, inefficient, and policing has also broken down in rural areas. Our judges may make foolish remarks from time to time.
But just as we haven't produced better painters than France or Italy, or finer composes than Germany or Austria, we have, I believe, a fairer criminal law than our European neighbours.

REALITY

Our country rebelled earlier against absolute power, we had our revolution earlier and the law has been, for longer, in the hnads of the people's representatives.
Above all, British law is not based on a fixed code, like Copntinental systems. It is law that has grown out of the reality of cases and so has been able to adjust and change with the times.
If we believe in these advantages, as I do, why on earth should we consent to our citizens being tried under an entirely different system?
These are facts too easily forgotten in an age which burbles of 'modernisation' (which means forgetting history) and 'globalisation' (which means nothing very much), and regards computer technology more interesting than the bill of rights.

When we have a system which has served us so well, we should all,
whatever our political beliefs, fight hard to protect it.
Our legal rights are too precious to be thoughtlessly signed away.

---

Thank you. You are visitor number since 13May00.
For comments on this page, please contact Briame Gerdan.
For further reading at this site, please return to Briame Gerdan's Home Page.

---