Speeches by Mullan.

“I beg to move amendment 41, in clause 3, page 5, line 38, at end insert— “(7) Where a court has determined in accordance with this section that a trial is to be conducted without a jury, the defendant may request a different judge to preside over the trial than the judge who made the determination that the case was sui…”

“I welcome that clarity; it will be interesting to see what happens as a result of that. I take what the Minister has said in good faith, and assume that she would not say that unless she was certain. That point is about the question of judicial review. The Opposition believe that there should be a right of appeal separ…”

“As I pointed out, at some point in these proceedings, even the Justice Secretary did not think it necessary. When he was considering these matters, the Justice Secretary agreed that it was perfectly reasonable for it not to be retrospective. We are actually making an argument with which, at one point, the Justice Secre…”

“I beg to move amendment 42, in clause 3, page 9, line 23, leave out subsection (4) and insert— “(4) Where a court has determined in accordance with section 74A that a trial is to be conducted without a jury, the court cannot pass a sentence of imprisonment or detention of more than three years on a person convicted of …”

“I think that wanting defendants to have the ability to challenge allocation decisions as they stand under a new court is pretty intellectually coherent. I am arguing that these are potentially significant, consequential decisions for defendants, and at the moment, as the Minister has explained, we all agree that there …”

“I absolutely think that we should leave the ECHR, because I do not like the mechanism that it operates under, but I absolutely support some of the rights and protections in principle that it advocates. I am struggling to see why there is a contradiction. There are lots of times when we might support elements of proposa…”

“If the Minister wants to intervene on me and say, “I am absolutely certain that there would be a right to judicially review the allocation decision by a Crown court,” I will be satisfied. I am asking for the Minister to stand up and say that she is absolutely certain.”

“I beg to move amendment 40, in clause 3, page 5, line 38, at end insert— “(7) Where a court has determined in accordance with this section that a trial is to be conducted without a jury, the defendant may appeal that decision if he can demonstrate that the circumstances of their case are such that trial without a jury …”

“As I said at the outset, there is a fundamental safeguard of people being able to have a judicial review of the allocation decision. It is all well and good for the hon. Member for Amber Valley to talk about the scenarios where it sails plainly, everyone is in agreement and it is all good. However, if it did not, at th…”

“Further to the intervention from the hon. Member for Bolton South and Walkden, it might be helpful to remind the Committee of the letter written by dozens of organisations representing women and girls. I was very clear that that letter actually represented women and girls as victims, but it absolutely makes the hon. La…”

“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Jardine. I rise to speak in support of amendment 43, tabled in my name, and to amendments 25 and 12. Again, on this issue the Opposition and the hon. Member for Bolton South and Walkden have alighted on the same challenge or issue—the same thing we think is unfair. …”

“Perhaps the Minister is sincerely—not deliberately—misunderstanding the point I make.”

“I rise to speak in support of amendment 40 in my name and to consider other related amendments. At this point, we are considering in more detail the allocation decisions, how they work in practice and the likely legal risks and pitfalls inherent in the new process. I will begin by laying out the process that will exist…”

“I think the Minister would accept that it is a high bar, but also that it is sometimes successfully crossed. Allocations are sometimes successfully challenged, which demonstrates just how important this provision is. If it is there and is used when things have gone so significantly wrong as to meet that high bar, it is…”

“I want to pick out a couple of points. The Minister has criticised the risk of retrials, and we have made several points about how other elements in the Bill will increase that risk through successful appeals and so on. I accept the Minister’s point that it is unlikely that these things will happen, but this is not so …”

“I hope the Minister will go on to clarify whether it is actually subject to judicial review.”

“This is a great opportunity for me to learn and understand an element of the system that I did not understand—I know about it, rather than understand it. I will go back to the point that we have made repeatedly. We are designing a system from scratch here. We have the opportunity to do things exactly as we want to. We …”

“This is very important. I have read the legislation to the Minister, and highlighted the point that a non-conviction element of the Crown court proceedings cannot be taken to judicial review. The Minister should either say that I am wrong about that and that something like an allocation decision in the Crown court can …”

“Yes, absolutely. In the NHS, I worked on what we might call change and improvement programmes or quality improvement programmes. We worked hard to replicate the best clinical practice everywhere, but it is simply not possible to directly replicate everything that goes on in every unit, although that is not to say that …”

“That goes straight to the point we discussed earlier about why it is important to separate the two, because in this scenario it is the same person all the way through. Ultimately, the sentencing process ends up being separate to the people who decide whether or not someone is guilty, and they will have decided the mode…”