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Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother 4 page


Recent results and the future 105

British politics, for example a change to a European-style system of proportional representation (so that Labour could at least share in a coalition government), or a formal union between Labour and the Liberal Democrats (so that together they could defeat the Conservatives).

However, in 1997 the picture changed dramatically. Labour won the largest majority in the House of Commons achieved by any party for 73 years and the Conservative share of the total vote was their lowest in 165 years. What happened? The answer seems to be that voting habits in Britain, reflecting the weakening of the class system, are no longer tribal. There was a time when the Labour party was regarded as the political arm of the trade unions, representing the working class of the country. Most working-class people voted Labour all their lives and nearly all middle-class people voted Conservative all their lives. The winning party at an election was the one who managed to get the support of the small number of 'floating voters'. But Labour has now got rid of its trade-union image. It is capable of winning as many middle-class votes as the Conservatives, so that the middle-class majority in the population, as identified by sociologists (see above), does not automatically mean a Conservative majority in the House of Commons.


 


QUESTIONS

1 The British electoral system is said to discrimin­ate against smaller parties. But look at the table at the beginning of this chapter again. How can it be that the very small parties had much better luck at winning parliamentary seats than the (comparatively large) Liberal Democrats?

2 In what ways is political campaigning in your country different from that in Britain as described in this chapter?

3 Is there a similar level of public interest in learn­ing about election results in your country as there is in Britain? Does it seem to reflect the general level of enthusiasm about, and interest in, politics which exist at other times - in Britain and in your own country?


 

4 Britain has 'single-member constituencies'. This means that one MP alone represents one par­ticular group of voters (everybody in his or her constituency). Is this a good system? Or is it better to have several MPs representing the same area? What are the advantages and disadvantages of the two systems?

5 Do you think that Britain should adopt the elect­oral system used in your country? Or perhaps you think that your country should adopt the system used in Britain? Or are the two different systems the right ones for the two different countries? Why?


 


SUGGESTIONS

• If you can get British television or radio, watch or listen in on thenight of the next British general election.



> The organization of the police force There is no national police force in Britain. All police employees work for one of the forty or so separate forces which each have responsibil­ity for a particular geographical area. Originally, these were set up locally. Only later did central government gain some control over them. It inspects them and has influence over senior appointments within them. In return, it provides about half of the money to run them. The other half comes from local government. The exception to this system is the Metropolitan Police Force, which polices Greater London. The 'Met' is under the direct control of central government. It also performs certain national police functions such as the registration of all crimes and crim­inals in England and Wales and the compilation of the missing persons register. New Scotland Yard is the famous building which is the head­quarters of its Criminal Investigation Department (CID).

The police and the public There was a time when a supposedly typical British policeman could be found in every tourist brochure for Britain. His strange-looking helmet and the fact that he did not carry a gun made him a unique symbol for tourists. The image of the friendly British 'bobby', with his fatherly manner, was also well-known within the country and was reinforced by popular television serials such as Dixon of Dock Green (> Images of the police: past and present). This positive image was not a complete myth. The system of policing was based on each police officer having his own 'beat', a particular neighbourhood which it was his duty to patrol. He usually did this on foot or sometimes by bicycle. The local bobby was a familiar figure on the streets, a reassur­ing presence that people felt they could trust absolutely. In the 196os the situation began to change in two ways. First, in response to an increasingly motorized society, and therefore increas­ingly motorized crime, the police themselves started patrolling in cars. As a result, individual police officers became remote figures and stopped being the familiar faces that they once were. A sign of this change was the new television police drama, Z Cars. This pro­gramme showed police officers as people with real problems and failings who did not always behave in the conventionally polite and reassuring manner. Some police were relieved to be presented as ordinary human beings. But the comparatively negative image of the police which this programme portrayed caused uproar and several senior police officials complained to the BBC about it! At the same time, the police found themselves having to deal increasingly with public demonstrations and with the activities of a generation who had no experience of war and therefore no obvious enemy-figure on which to focus their youthful feelings of rebellion. These young people started to see the police as the symbol of everything they disliked about society. Police officers were no longer known as 'bobbies' but became the 'fuzz' or the 'cops' or the 'pigs'. Since the middle years of the twentieth century, the police in Britain have lost much of their positive image. A child who is lost is still advised to find a police officer, but the sight of one no longer creates a general feeling of reassurance. In the i98os there

 




Crime and criminal procedure 107


were a large number of cases in which it was found that police officers had lied and cheated in order to get people convicted of crimes (> The Stefan Kizsko case). As a result, trust in the honesty and incorruptibility of the police has declined. Nevertheless, there is still a great deal of public sympathy for the police. It is felt that they are doing an increasingly difficult job under difficult circumstances. The assumption that their role is to serve the public rather than to be agents of the government persists. Police officers often still address members of the public as 'sir' or 'madam'. Senior officers think it is important for the police to establish a rela­tionship with local people, and the phrase 'community policing' is now fashionable. Some police have even started to patrol on foot again. Generally speaking, the relationship between police and public in Britain compares quite favourably with that in some other European countries. British police still do not carry guns in the course of normal duty (although all police stations have a store of weapons). Crime and criminal procedure There is a widespread feeling among the British public that crime is increasing. Figures on this matter are notoriously difficult to evalu­ate, however. One reason for this is that not all actual crimes are necessarily reported. Official figures suggest that the crime of rape increased by more than r-o% between 1988 and 1992. But these figures may represent an increase in the number of victims willing to report rape rather than a real increase in cases of rape. > Images of the police: past and present



> The Stefan Kizsko case On 18 February 1992, a man who had spent the previous sixteen years of his life in prison serving a sen­tence for murder was released. It had been proved that he did not in fact commit the crime. In the early 1990s a large number of people were let out of British gaols after spending several years serving sentences for crimes they did not commit. The most famous of these were 'the Guildford Four' and 'the Birmingham Six', both groups of people convicted of terrorist bombings. In every case, previous court judgements were changed when it became clear that the police had not acted properly (for example, they had falsified the evid­ence of their notebooks or had not revealed important evidence). Public confidence in the police diminished. In the case of the alleged bombers, there remained some public sympathy. The police officers involved may have been wrong but they were trying to catch terrorists. The Kizsko case was dif­ferent. He did not belong to an illegal organization. His only 'crime' was that he was in the wrong place at the wrong time. He also con­formed to a stereotype, which made him an easy victim of prejudice. He was of below average intelligence and he had a foreign name, so a jury was likely to see him as a potential murderer.

 


108II The law


> Caution! 'You do not have to say anything unless you wish lo do so, but what you say may be given in evidence'. These words are well-known to almost everybody in Britain. They have been heard in thousands of police dramas on television. For a long time they formed what is tech­nically known as the caution, which must be read out to an arrested person in order to make the arrest legal. But, in 1994, the British gov­ernment decided that the 'right to silence' contained in the caution made things too easy for criminals. This right meant that the refusal of an arrested person to answer police questions could not be used as part of the evidence against him or her. Now, however, it can. To accord with the new law, the words of the caution have had to be changed. The new formula is: 'You do not have to say anything. But if you do not mention now something which you later use in your defence, the court may decide that your failure to mention it now strengthens the case against you. A record will be made of anything you say and it may be given in evidence if you are brought to trial*. Civil liberties groups in Britain are angry about this change. They say that many arrested people find it too difficult to understand and that it is not fair to encourage people to defend themselves immediately against charges about which they do not yet know the details. They are also afraid it encourages false confessions.


> Is crime increasing in Britain? British people think that crime is rising in Britain, but it is impossible to give a completely reliable answer to this question. Figures vary from year to year. In 1993 for instance, the total number of recorded crimes in the London area actually went down by around i o%. And the murder rate is no higher, or even lower, than it was during the second half of the nineteenth century. However, there is no doubt that in the last quarter of the twentieth century there was a definite increase in certain types of crime. Crimes with firearms (guns, rifles etc) are an example, as the graph shows.

Nevertheless, it is generally accepted that in the last quarter of the twentieth century, the number of crimes went up (> Is crime increasing in Britain?). And the fear of crime seems to have increased a lot. This has gone together with a lack of confidence in the ability of the police to catch criminals. In the early 1990s private security firms were one of the fastest-growing businesses in the country. Another response to the perceived situation has been the growth of Neighbourhood Watch schemes. They attempt to educate people in crime prevention and to encourage the people of a particular neighbourhood to look out for anything suspicious. In 1994 the government was even con­sidering helping members of these schemes to organize patrols. There has also been some impatience with the rules of criminal procedure under which the police and courts have to operate. The police are not, of course, above the law. When they arrest somebody on suspicion of having committed a crime, they have to follow certain procedures. For example, unless they obtain special permission, they are not allowed to detain a person for more than twenty-four hours without formally charging that person with having committed a crime. Even after they have charged somebody, they need permission to remand that person in custody (i.e. to keep him or her in prison) until the case is heard in court. In 1994 public concern about crim­inals 'getting away with it' led the government to make one very controversial change in the law (> Caution!).


 


The system of justice 109



The system of justice The system of justice in England and Wales, in both civil and criminal cases, is (as it is in North America) an adversarial system. In criminal cases there is no such thing as an examining magistrate who tries to discover the real truth about what happened. In formal terms it is not the business of any court to find out 'the truth'. Its job is simply to decide 'yes' or 'no' to a particular proposition (in criminal cases, that a certain person is guilty of a certain crime) after it has heard arguments and evidence from both sides (in criminal cases these sides are known as the defence and the prosecution). There are basically two kinds of court. More than 90% of all cases are dealt with in magistrates' courts. Every town has one of these. In them, a panel of magistrates (usually three) passes judgement. In cases where they have decided somebody is guilty of a crime, they can also impose a punishment. This can be imprisonment for up to a year, or it can be a fine, although if it is a person's 'first offence' and the crime is not serious, they often impose no punishment at all (t> The sentence of this court is...). Magistrates' courts are another example of the importance of amateurism in British public life. Magistrates, who are also known as Justices of the Peace (JPs), are not trained lawyers. They are just ordinary people of good reputation who have been appointed to the job by a local committee. They do not get a salary or a fee for their work (though they get paid expenses). Inevitably, they tend to come

> How many victims? One way of estimating the level of crime is to interview people and ask them whether they have been the victims of crime. On the left are some of the results of a survey in 1990 which interviewed 2,000 people in several countries. The figures show the percentages of interviewees who said they had been victims. > The sentence of this court is... If it is someone's first offence, and the crime is a small one, even a guilty person is oftenuncondition­ally discharged. He or she is set free without punishment. The next step up the ladder is a conditional discharge. This means that the guilty person is set free but if he or she commits another crime within a stated time, the first crime will be taken into account. He or she may also be puton probation,which means that regular meetings with a social worker must take place. A very common form of punish­ment for minor offences is a fine,which means that the guilty person has to pay a sum of money. Another possibility is that the convicted person is sentenced to a certain number of hours of com­munity service. Wherever possible, magistrates and judges try not to imprisonpeople. This costs the state money, the country's prisons are already overcrowded and prisons have a reputation for being 'schools for crime'. Even people who are sent to prison do not usually serve the whole time to which they were sen­tenced. They get 'remission' of their sentence for 'good behaviour'. There is nodeath penalti in Britain, except for treason. It was abolished for all other offences in 1969. Although public opinion polk often show a majority in favour of its return, a majority of MPs has always been against it. For mur­derers, there is an obligatorylife sentence. However, 'life' does not normally mean life.

 


110 11The law

 

 


> Some terms connected with the legal system acquitted found not guilty by the court bail a sum of money guaranteed by somebody on behalf of a person who has been charged with a crime so that he or she can go free until the time of the trial. If he or she does not appear in court, the person "standing bail' has to pay the money. convicted found guilty by the court defendant the party who denies a claim in court; the person accused of a crime on remand in prison awaiting trial party one of the sides in a court case. Because of the adversarial system, there must always be two parties in any case: one to make a claim and one to deny this claim. plaintiff the party who makes a claim in court. In nearly all crim­inal cases, the plaintiff is the police. verdict the decision of the court A typical courtroom scene showing the judge, the jury, and a witness being ques­tioned by a barrister (cameras are not allowed in court)

from the wealthier sections of society and, in times past, their preju­dices were very obvious. They were especially harsh, for instance, on people found guilty of poaching (hunting animals on private land), even though these people sometimes had to poach in order to put food on their families' tables. In modern times, however, some care is taken to make sure that JPs are recruited from as broad a section of society as possible. Even serious criminal cases are first heard in a magistrate's court. However, in these cases, the JPs only need to decide that there is a prima facie case against the accused (in other words, that it is possible that he or she may be guilty)/they then refer the case to a higher court. In most cases this will be a crown court, where a professional lawyer acts as the judge and the decision regarding guilt or innocence is taken by a jury. Juries consist of twelve people selected at random from the list of voters. They do not get paid for their services and are obliged to perform this duty. In order for a verdict to be reached, there must be agreement among at least ten of them. If this does not happen, the judge has to declare a mistrial and the case must start all over again with a different jury. A convicted person may appeal to the Court of Criminal Appeal (generally known just as the Appeal Court) in London either to have the conviction quashed (i.e. the jury's previous verdict is overruled and they are pronounced 'not guilty') or to have the sentence (i.e. punishment) reduced. The highest court of all in Britain is the House of Lords (see chapter 9). The duty of the judge during a trial is to act as the referee while the prosecution and defence put their cases and question witnesses, and to decide what evidence is admissible and what is not (what can or can't be taken into account by the jury). It is also, of course, the judge's job to impose a punishment (known as 'pronouncing sentence') on those found guilty of crimes.

 



The legal profession 111


The legal profession There are two distinct kinds of lawyer in Britain. One of these is a solicitor. Everybody who needs a lawyer has to go to one of these. They handle most legal matters for their clients, including the drawing up of documents (such as wills, divorce papers and contracts), communicating with other parties, and presenting their clients' cases in magistrates' courts. However, only since 1994 have solicitors been allowed to present cases in higher courts. If the trial is to be heard in one of these, the solicitor normally hires the services of the other kind of lawyer - a barrister. The only function of barristers is to present cases in court. The training of the two kinds of lawyer is very different. All soli­citors have to pass the Law Society exam. They study for this exam while 'articled' to established firms of solicitors where they do much of the everyday junior work until they are qualified. Barristers have to attend one of the four Inns of Court in London. These ancient institutions are modelled somewhat on Oxbridge col­leges (see chapter 14). For example, although there are some lectures, the only attendance requirement is to eat dinner there on a certain number of evenings each term. After four years, the trainee barristers then sit exams. If they pass, they are 'called to the bar' and are recognized as barristers. However, they are still not allowed to present a case in a crown court. They can only do this after several more years of association with a senior barrister, after which the most able of them apply to 'take silk'. Those whose applications are accepted can put the letters QC (Queen's Counsel) after their names. Neither kind of lawyer needs a university qualification. The vast majority of barristers and most solicitors do in fact go to university, but they do not necessarily study law there. This arrangement is typically British (see chapter 14). The different styles of training reflect the different worlds that the two kinds of lawyer live in, and also the different skills that they develop. Solicitors have to deal with the realities of the everyday world and its problems. Most of their work is done away from the courts. They often become experts in the details of particular areas of the law. Barristers, on the other hand, live a more rarefied existence. For one thing, they tend to come from the upper strata of society. Furthermore, their protection from everyday realities is increased by certain legal rules. For example, they are not supposed to talk to any of their clients, or to their client's witnesses, except in the presence of the solicitor who has hired them. They are experts on general principles of the law rather than on details, and they acquire the special skill of eloquence in public speaking. When they present a case in court, they, like judges, put on the archaic gown and wig which, it is supposed, emphasize the impersonal majesty of the law. It is exclusively from the ranks of barristers that judges are appointed. Once they have been appointed, it is almost impossible


> Ministry of justice? Actually there is no such thing in Britain. The things that such a minis­try takes care of in other countries are shared between a number of authorities, in particular the Home Office, which administers prisons and supervises the police, and the office of the Lord Chancellor, which oversees the appointment of judges, magistrates and other legal officers. > The law in Scotland Scotland has its own legal system, separate from the rest of the United Kingdom. Although it also uses an adversarial system of legal proced­ure, the basis of its law is closer to Roman and Dutch law. The names of several officials in Scotland are also different from those in England and Wales. A very noticeable feature is that there are three, not just two, possible verdicts. As well as 'guilty' and 'not guilty', a jury may reach a verdict of 'not proven', which means that the accused person cannot be punished but is not com­pletely cleared of guilt either.

 


112 11 The law

for them to be dismissed. The only way that this can be done is by a resolution of both Houses of Parliament, and this is something that has never happened. Moreover, their retiring age is later than in most other occupations. They also get very high salaries. These things are considered necessary in order to ensure their independence from interference, by the state or any other party. However, the result of their background and their absolute security in their jobs is that, although they are often people of great learning and intelligence, some judges appear to have difficulty understanding the problems and circumstances of ordinary people, and to be out of step with general public opinion. The judgements and opinions that they give in court sometimes make the headlines because they are so spectacu­larly out of date. (The inability of some of them to comprehend the meaning of racial equality is one example. A senior Old Bailey judge in the 1980s once referred to black people as 'nig-nogs' and to some Asians involved in a case as 'murderous Sikhs'.)


 


QUESTIONS

1 The public perception of British police officers has changed over the last thirty years. In what ways has it changed, and why do you think this is?

2 It is one of the principles of the British legal system that you are innocent until proven guilty. However, miscarriages of justice do occur. How did the ones described in this chapter come about?

3 What are the main differences between the legal system in your country and that in Britain? Is there anything like the 'right to silence'? Are there any unpaid 'amateur' legal officers similar to Justices of the Peace? What kind of training do lawyers undergo? Compared with the system in your country, what do you see as the strengths and weaknesses of the British system?


 

4 British people believe that there is more crime in Britain than there used to be. What reasons

could there be for this? Is it true? Do you think of Britain as a 'safe' or 'dangerous' place? What about your own country - has crime increased there, or do people think that it has?

5 Many people in Britain argue that imprisonment is an ineffective and expensive form of punish­ment. Do you agree with this view? What alternative forms of punishment in use in Britain or in your country do you think are better, if any?


 


SUGGESTIONS

• There are many contemporary British writers who concentrate on the theme of crime and detection, among them Colin Dexter, whose books (such as The Dead of Jericho, Last Bus to Woodstock and The Wench is Dead) feature Inspector Morse. (Many of them have been adapted for television.) P D James and Ruth Rendell are two other highly respected writers of crime fiction.



International relations


 


The relationship between any country and the rest of the world can

reveal a great deal about that country.

The end of empire

The map below shows the British empire in i 91 9, at the time of its greatest extent. By this time, however, it was already becoming less of an empire and more of a confederation. At the same international conference at which Britain acquired new possessions (formerly German) under the Treaty of Versailles, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa were all represented separately from Britain.

The real dismantling of the empire took place in the twenty-five years following the Second World War and with the loss of empire went a loss of power and status. These days, Britain's armed forces can no longer act unilaterally, without reference to the international community. Two events illustrate this. First, Suez. In 1956, Egypt, without prior agreement, took over the Suez canal from the interna­tional company owned by Britain and France. British and French


114 12 International relations


The opening ceremony of the Com­monwealth Games in 1994. This athletics contest is held every four years.


^The Commonwealth The dismantling of the British empire took place comparatively peacefully, so that good relations between Britain and the newly inde­pendent countries were established. As a result, and with the encourage­ment of Queen Elizabeth II, an international organization called the Commonwealth, composed of the countries that used to be part of the empire, has continued to hold annual meetings. Some countries in the Commonwealth have even kept the British monarch as head of state. There are no formal economic or political advantages involved in belonging to the Commonwealth, but it has helped to keep cultural contacts alive, and does at least mean that every year the leaders of a sixth of the world's population sit down and talk together. Until quite recently it did have economic importance, with special trading agreements between members. But since Britain became a full member of the EEC, all but a few of these agreements have gradually been dis­continued.

military action to stop this was a diplomatic disaster. The USA did not support them and their troops were forced to withdraw. Second, Cyprus. When this country left the British empire, Britain became one of the guarantors of its independence from any other country. However, when Turkey invaded the island in 1974, British military activity was restricted to airhfting the personnel of its military base there to safety. After the Second World War and throughout the 1950s, it was understood that a conference of the world's great powers involved the USA, the Soviet Union and Britain. However, in 1962, the Cuban missile crisis, one of the greatest threats to global peace since the war, was resolved without reference to Britain. By the 1970s it was generally accepted that a 'superpower' conference involved only the USA and the Soviet Union. Despite Britain's loss of power and status on the world stage, some small remnants of the empire remain, Whatever their racial origins, the inhabitants of Gibraltar, St Helena, the Ascension Islands, the Falklands/Malvinas and Belize have all wished to continue with the imperial arrangement (they are afraid of being swallowed up by their nearest neighbours). For British governments, on the one hand this is a source of pride, but on the other hand it causes embarrassment and irritation: pride, because it suggests how beneficial the British imperial administration must have been; embarrassment, because the possession of colonial territories does not fit with the image of a modern democratic state; and irritation because it costs the British taxpayer money. The old imperial spirit is not quite dead. In 1982 the British govern­ment spent hundreds of millions of pounds to recapture the Falklands/Malvinas Islands from the invading Argentinians. We cannot know if it would have done so if the inhabitants had not been in favour of remaining British and if Argentina had not had a military dictatorship at the time. But what we do know is that the govern­ment's action received enormous popular support at home. Before the 'Falklands War', opinion polls showed that the government was extremely unpopular; afterwards, it suddenly became extremely popular and easily won the general election early in the following year.

 


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