Fraud Bill [HL]

I support the amendment for all the reasons given by the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart. I am sorry not to have been able to support for any of the   amendments proposed by the noble Lord, Lord   Kingsland, this afternoon. The reason is simple: this is a very good Bill indeed and there is only one major flaw in it, which is covered by the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart. I am afraid I was unable to attend the open meeting held by the noble and learned Lord. I apologised for my inability to attend. I have, of course, read his letter, to which he has already referred, with great interest. I must say, however, that I do not find the reasons it gives convincing. I have paid particular attention to the list of those who supported the retention of the offence of conspiracy to defraud, apart from the CPS and the FSO. We all knew that they would support it. Their arguments were very effectively dealt with by the Law Commission in paragraphs 5.23 and 5.24 of the report. What of the other bodies that support the retention of the offence? There is the Fraud Advisory Panel, to which the noble and learned Lord referred, at the bottom of page one; something called the British Retail Consortium on page two; the Mobile Industry Crime Action Forum on page three, and a few others. One only has to look at that list, and compare it with the list of those who gave evidence in answer to the consultation paper as set out on pages 102 and 103, to see that the vast weight of the evidence must have been in favour of abolishing conspiracy to defraud. In particular, I am interested in the views of all the judges and QCs who have hands-on experience of how conspiracy to defraud works. Those are set out on page 102. I find it difficult to believe that none of those recommended the abolition of conspiracy to defraud, although it is said in the letter that all those judges who expressed views favoured retention. But there it is. In any event, wherever the weight lies—as I say, it seems to lie in favour of abolishing conspiracy to defraud—that is clearly the view to which the commission came. It expressed its view in forthright terms, in the paragraphs to which the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart, has already referred. Of course, there are practical reasons why the CPS likes to charge people with conspiracy to defraud in complex fraud cases. Everybody knows that. But that does not deal with the point of principle stated by the Law Commission—the blot on our law which conspiracy to defraud represents. Then it is said in the letter that only 1,000 of the 15,000 cases of fraud were charged as conspiracy to defraud in 2003. I am not sure how that helps the argument either way. In any event, the relevant question is surely how many of those 1,000 could now be dealt with under the new substantive offences. If, as I suspect, the great majority could be dealt with under the new offences, then surely that is an overwhelming argument in favour of abolishing conspiracy to defraud now. There are always arguments for delaying decisions. All too often, it is a weak way out. We should abolish conspiracy to defraud now. We could always delay bringing the abolition into force for a year or two to see how things work out, as suggested by the noble Lord, Lord Goodhart. Unless we do at least that, however, at some stage I shall want to vote in favour of this amendment as it stands.