What Does It Mean?

The Crown Prosecution Service has dropped all charges against a man who was due to stand trial next year over allegations that he failed to stop at the scene of an accident, failed to report an accident and driving without due care and attention.

In words I seem to have seen before, the reviewing lawyer for the CPS said: ‘I have reviewed the file of evidence passed to me ... and have concluded that there is insufficient evidence to provide a realistic prospect of conviction.’

What does this mean? Does it mean that the man concerned might have committed the offences but there is not enough evidence to prosecute? Or does it mean that the charges were dropped because, as he had stated, the man was innocent?

The CPS statement leaves things in the air somewhat, but let’s assume the man was innocent.
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‘Craven Abdication Of Responsibility’

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Last week I took a poke at the Crown Prosecution Service for foolishly sending a case to court involving a trivial injury by a Pritt Stick. I made the point that some cases require the application of a good dose of common sense.

Yesterday a man was cleared by Sheffield Crown Court of a charge of rape falsely brought by a woman who eighteen months earlier had made a similar false claim against a man who ended up committing suicide as a result.

In the latest case, the judge said, ‘The evidence did not, and was never going to, prove rape’. Judge Patrick Robertshaw went on to deliver a scathing attack on the Crown Prosecution Service, part of which is worth repeating here:

‘The prime overriding consideration in the CPS’s decision had been merely that the complainant wished the case to go ahead. It was little short of a craven abdication of responsibility for making an independent and fair minded assessment of the case. It is quite astonishing these decisions are made by those who simply do not have experience of what happens in Crown Court because they never come into Crown Court. They sit behind desks and make decisions that result in this sort of trial taking place.’

The shocking thing is that, after making such allegations against two innocent men, the woman involved cannot be named. The law here should be changed, and quickly.

One hopes that someone will shake up the Crown Prosecution Service who are also heavily criticised this morning for bringing the case against two ten-year-old boys accused of raping an eight-year-old girl who some say may merely have been playing ‘doctors and nurses’.
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‘This Rotten Parliament!’

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In 1648 Edward Sexby in expressing the mood of the ordinary people of Britain complained about the King and his ‘rotten Parliament’. The mood of the ordinary people, or more properly that of Oliver Cromwell and his associates, ultimately led to the execution of Charles I and to a new Parliamentary system.

362 years later the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, Nick Clegg, used exactly the same words when referring to the debacle of MPs expenses. He got that right!

Look at the newspapers today. We learn that over half of our MPs have been ordered to repay £1.1 million following Sir Thomas Legg’s review of their expense claims for the last five years. This morning, the Director of Public Prosecutions has announced that the Crown Prosecution Service will charge three MPs and one peer under the Theft Act.

This has been a Rotten Parliament. Not only for taking us into a needless war with Iraq, for allowing taxation to reach new levels, for allowing bankers to overreach themselves and so put the economy at risk and for ... the list is endless.

But above all, many of the MPs in this Rotten Parliament have shown that they have milked a ‘flawed’ expense system for all it is worth and, even now, they complain they have been unfairly treated. Those charged this morning have also raised the question as to whether they are covered by Parliamentary Privilege!

Some of the amounts to be repaid are trivial, like .35p for a cup of Horlicks claimed by a Tory MP. Other amounts are staggering, such as £42,458 to be repaid by a junior minister or the married couple of Tory MPs who managed to milk the system for £60,000.

It was the Daily Telegraph that first uncovered the scandal of MPs expenses and, despite objections from the then Speaker and Government seniors, it persisted. It was right to do so for if we cannot have trust in our MPs personal behaviour we cannot trust them for anything else.

MPs are meant to represent what Edward Sexby referred to as the ‘ordinary people of Britain’. It is to be hoped that those elected to the next Parliament will show that they can do so.

The words of Oliver Cromwell all those years ago when addressing the Long Parliament ring as true today as it did then.

‘Begone, you have sat here too long. It is time to give way to honester men!’
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