Legislation
Violent Crime Reduction Bill
The Violent Crime Reduction Bill was published on 8 June 2005. Measures in the Bill include:
- Making it illegal to manufacture or sell imitation firearms that could be mistaken for real firearms;
- Bringing in higher sentences for carrying imitation firearms;
- Creating tougher manufacturing standards to ensure that imitation firearms can’t be converted to fire real ammunition;
- Increasing the age limit for buying or firing an air weapon without supervision from 17 to 18;
- Making it an offence to use other people to hide or carry guns or knives;
- Increasing the age limit for purchasing a knife from 16 to 18;
- Introducing powers for head-teachers and other members of staff to search pupils for knives;
- Introducing Alcohol Disorder Zones (ADZs) which will require licensed premises to contribute to the cost of alcohol-related disorder in specific areas where it has been identified as a problem;
- Excluding individuals responsible for alcohol-related disorder from certain areas and licensed premises by imposing ‘Drinking Banning Orders’ which could run for up to 2 years;
- Creating powers for police to ban the sale of alcohol at licensed premises for up to 48-hours for selling alcohol to under 18’s; and
- Providing police with the power to exclude individuals at risk of carrying out alcohol-related disorder from a specific area for up to 48 hours.
Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Bill
The Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims Bill received Royal Assent on Monday 15 November 2004. Measures in the Bill include:
- Significant new police powers to deal with domestic violence including making it an arrestable, criminal offence to breach a non-molestation order, with a penalty of up to five years in prison.
- Making common assault an arrestable offence.
- Stronger legal protection for victims by extending the use of restraining orders - giving courts the power to impose a restraining order where the defendant has been acquitted but the court believes an order is necessary to protect the victim from harassment.
- Providing a code of practice, binding on all criminal justice agencies, so that all victims receive the support, protection, information and advice they need.
- Allowing victims to take their case to the Parliamentary Ombudsman if they felt the Code had not been adhered to by the criminal justice agencies.
- Setting up an independent commissioner for victims to give victims a powerful voice at the heart of Government and to safeguard and promote the interests of victims and witnesses, encouraging the spread of good practice and reviewing the statutory code.
- Amending the Protection from Harassment Act 1997 to ensure that victims have their say if an application is made to vary or terminate a restraining order that is protecting them from abuse or harassment.
- Strengthening the civil law on domestic violence so that cohabiting same-sex couples have the same protection as heterosexual couples, and extending the availability of non-molestation orders to couples who have never lived together or have never been married.
- Creating a new offence of familial homicide for causing or allowing the death of child or vulnerable adult.
- Bringing in the Law Commission recommendation for a two stage court trial to ensure that high volume crimes like fraud and internet child pornography can be punished in full.
Criminal Justice Act 2003
The Criminal Justice Act 2003 received Royal Assent on 20 November 2003. It will modernise the criminal justice system from end to end so that it delivers justice more often and more consistently. The measures in the Act will have real benefits, creating a justice system which supports and informs victims, respects and protects witnesses and delivers justice on behalf of victims, defendants and the community.
Through new provisions and closer working between the Police and the CPS, we will ensure that more crimes are detected, that offending on bail is reduced, and that we get more defendants to court.
Reforms to the criminal trial process will enable the courts to convict more of the guilty through ensuring that cases focus on the relevant issues and do not contain any surprises, and that magistrates, judges and juries are able to hear all the relevant evidence.
Our sentencing policy will put sense into sentencing, ensuring that the punishment is appropriate for the offender and the offence. The focus on rehabilitation will help to reduce re-offending and contribute to safer communities.
New drugs provisions will provide offenders who use drugs with the means to tackle their addiction, and consequently cut the huge amount of offending which is directly and indirectly drug-related.
In conjunction with the Police Reform Act 2002 and Courts Act 2003, the new measures in the Criminal Justice Act 2003 will create a system which convicts the guilty, acquits the innocent and reduces offending and re-offending.
The Act brings forward many of the proposals in the White Paper Justice for All and on the reviews conducted by Sir Robin Auld and John Halliday of the criminal courts and sentencing policy.
The Sexual Offences Act 2003
Sexual crime, and the fear of sexual crime, has a profound and damaging effect on individuals and on the social fabric of communities. The fight against it is of the highest priority to this Government. The Sexual Offences Act 2003 strengthens the registration requirements for sex offenders on the one hand, and comprehensively reforms and modernises the law on sex offences on the other.