Speeches by Wright.

“That is true, but I suppose it is conceivable that somebody would none the less, in the course of debate, choose to talk about a case that is sub judice.”

“That is a very good question. You are sitting next to Sir Christopher, who has been doing it for a lot longer than I have. The answer specifically is, I do not think so, but that is likely to be because this hardly every occurs, and certainly not in Committee proceedings. Of course, the Panel of Chairs will chair eithe…”

“As would I. Between us we cover about a decade’s worth of being in the Attorney General’s Office, and I have no recollection of any incidents. Because I don’t trust my own recollection, I went and asked the Attorney General’s Office to check, and there was no such incident in the four years I did the job, so I don’t th…”

“I agree. The only thing that we might want to think about as a legislature is that, although Dominic is quite right, the reason this does not often arise as a problem is that, generally, identities are not promulgated after arrest in the way they were. It is not unlawful to do that, and we might want to think again, as…”

“I do not have much to add. Inevitably, the exercise of discretion is a balancing exercise. You have to decide which risk outweighs all the others. I think the point here is that there is still a risk of prejudicing proceedings even at the sentencing stage, but it is a much lower risk, so it is quite likely that the Spe…”

“I do not have much to add. The reality of this job is that you subject yourself to the judgments of the Chair. Control is in the hands of the Speaker or of the Chair of whichever Committee the proceedings are taking place in. It is up to them to decide whether the sub judice rule applies and, generally speaking, to say…”

“I agree with that. I think it could be very helpful. There is an eternal conflict between clarity on the one hand and flexibility on the other. We all encounter it every time we try to make law. If you want to be able to deal with circumstances as they arise, you obviously want flexibility, but you also want people to …”

“They can be, but I think with sufficient guidance we can all understand what we can say and what we cannot. As I said, the majority of Members of Parliament—I know you are one of them, Sir Gavin—would not wish to prejudice criminal proceedings. I think people want guidance so that they can understand how far they can g…”

“It is a fair question. We have talked about why there is a sub judice resolution. It is not just to be irritating to Members of Parliament; it is because there is good reason for protecting the integrity of criminal process. That is largely because, as I said earlier, I think we would all want to see those responsible …”

“Indeed, but there is nothing, as far as I can see, in the sub judice resolution that prevents anybody here from criticising that quango for acting in that way. The restriction is only in relation to judicial proceedings, and the activities of IPSO are not judicial proceedings.”

“My answer is no. The only circumstance in which they would have done so is if something had been said in Parliament that they believed would prejudice a prosecution, and I think we are of the view that there have not been cases that have got to that level of concern. I cannot think of one, no.”

“The way I read the sub judice resolution is that it is designed to prevent the corruption or undue influence of legal proceedings when they begin. Frankly, I think that would apply to whichever route is taken to reach legal proceedings. I think, probably, what you are concerned about is already covered. The issue may b…”

“There cannot be any harm in making Members of Parliament more aware than they are now of what the sub judice resolution actually says. There is no downside to greater education. By all means, let us find a way of making sure everybody understands clearly what it says, but, as Dominic said, that is a very different thin…”

“One is worse than the other.”

“It is probably worth restating Dominic’s earlier point about comity. There is a reason that judges are undoubtedly more robust than juries. It is not about judges being clever and juries not; it is about their experience of determining what evidence is relevant and what is not. That is what we train judges to do; they …”

“Do you mean to cover decisions that they make on which we as parliamentarians might want to comment?”

“Again, I think I can say I do not think it did happen, and I do not think it even came close to happening in my time. There is a distinction to be made between the application of the sub judice rule and contempt of court proceedings, where certainly things did happen that required our intervention—sometimes by way of w…”

“Again, the same would apply. Essentially, the thing about the Attorney General’s Office is that it is broadly a reactive department, not a proactive one. If somebody came to us with an issue, we would absolutely have been engaged as Attorneys General, but we would also have engaged our staff in the Attorney General’s O…”

“I agree with part of that, but not all of it. It is certainly right, as Michael says, that the risk of prejudice diminishes over time, but there is a distinction to be made between the Contempt of Court Act process and sub judice in the House, which is that there are very significant penalties attached to the Contempt …”

“As we indicated earlier, I think the answer to that is very little. It is very different when you are talking about contempt of court more broadly, but if you are asking about the specific workings of the sub judice resolution in the House of Commons, I do not think I had a single occasion where I was obliged, as Attor…”