Ed Cape

Adversarialism ‘lite’: developments in criminal procedure and evidence under New Labour

Abstract No one wants to see the justice system in Britain damaged. No one wants to see anyone rip up the justice system and start again. The rule of law is paramount; no one wants to see the law as anything other than the law. But, at the same time, the need for reform is clear. The view that change is required is widespread. The law needs to be done; but the way we do law needs to change. We need to do law, but we need to do law differently. Lord Falconer, Doing Law Differently (DCA, April 2006)

Criminal justice under the Coalition

We will be strong in defence of freedom. The Government believes that the British state has become too authoritarian, and that over the past decade it has abused and eroded fundamental human freedoms and historic civil liberties. We need to restore the rights of individuals in the face of encroaching state power, in keeping with Britains tradition of freedom and fairness … We will implement a full programme of measures to reverse the substantial erosion of civil liberties and roll back state intrusion… We will restore rights to non-violent protest. (HM Government, 2010)

Criminal defence rights in a global context

The right to fair trial is one of those motherhood and apple pie, feel good, aphorisms that no-one, and no government, can seriously disagree with. However, it is often preceded with ‘of course’ – as in ‘of course fair trial is important’, and then often followed by ‘but’ – as in ‘but the system must be efficient’. As soon as you begin to ask what it means, and particularly if you ask what it means in terms of the rights of those suspected or accused of crime, the picture rapidly becomes clouded. In the United Kingdom, and in many other countries, the rise of managerialism and the ‘discovery’ of victims as a political constituency has meant that whilst lip-service is paid to fair trial, the importance of defence rights in the criminal process, both as a substantive aspect of human rights and as a key element of the right to fair trial, has been side-lined if not forgotten.