Irvine calls Auld 'radical'

White Paper A white paper on criminal justice should appear next spring, following the end of the consultation period into the report by Lord Justice Auld - on 30 January 2002 - the Lord Chancellor, Lord Irvine, said this week.Lord Irvine described the contents of the report as radical and highly controversial, but he indicated that criminal justice required major legislation that would take several years to implement properly.Asked in a question-and-answer session for the House of Commons home affairs committee whether the proposed reforms were a Treasury-driven exercise, the Lord Chancellor said that in framing his proposals Lord Justice Auld was not thinking about money, 'he was thinking about the fairest system'.When asked whether he was in favour of the recommendations, he dodged replying, but said that certain pressing recommendations might be taken up as a matter of urgency.

An example of these was the suggestion that if police are too overstretched for court security duties, a uniformed court protection constabulary should be considered.Lord Irvine supported the Home Secretary's announcement that certain legislative measures to deal with terrorism in the current international crisis did not prejudice the objectives of the Human Rights Act - 'extreme circumstances call for extreme measures', he said.Discussing proposed freedom of information legislation, the Lord Chancellor said there was ongoing discussion in Whitehall as to whether a big bang - introducing measures across all public institutions simultaneously - or a step-by-step implementation should be used.

Either way he said the legislation would be implemented by 2005.Of the government's pilots for a criminal defender service, Lord Irvine said they were experiments only, and 'if we don't obtain benefit from them we won't continue with them'.

He hoped it might eventually develop into a high-quality service.Of the changes made to the legal aid regime, the Lord Chancellor was buoyant.

There were no plans to regulate claims management companies, he said.

Lord Irvine added that he had not received any correspondence personally complaining about conditional fee agreements; 'the proof of the pudding is in the eating,' he said.

Jeremy Fleming: Lord Chancellor to push through some of criminal justice recommendations