CONFIDENTIAL
SAVING DESPATCH
HKK 14/9
From the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affaire
To the Officer Administering the Government of HONG KONG.
Date 25 November 1968.
No. 663 Saving.
Your Despatch No. 1279 of 1 October.
Criminal Procedure (Amendment)
(No. 2) Ordinance 1968.
Although it is not proposed to recommend the withholding of notification of Her Majesty's non-disallowance of this Ordinamos (notifiontion is being conveyed to you by formal despatch), the two new scations which it adds to the principal Ordinance depart in certain respects from fundamental principles inherent in the British system of justice. Further amending legislation as indicated below will therefore be required to restore the situation.
2.
The new section 122. The inveterate rule is that justice shall be administered in open court apart from cases of "parental jurisdiction" and powers conferred by statute. The Supreme Court of Hong Kong has, however, very
the court and of punishing for cont.. inherent powers of clearing
contemptuous
interference with judicial proceedings whether in the court itself or in the precinots of the court) mot only in respect of itself but also in respect of courts subordinate to it. A district Judge or a magistrate in Hong Kong has no such inherent powers. Such powers as they normally have to deal with contempt are conferred on them by statute and we are not aware of any British territory in which the very wide discretion inherent in the Supreme Court as regards clearing the court and punishing contempt has been conferred as part of the permanent law by statute on a judge or a magistrate of a subordinate court. Although in times of emergenay the conferring of auch extensive powers on subordinate courts may be justified, it is very questionable whether there is sufficient justification for doing this in normal times, even in the special circumstances of Hong Kong. It is one matter for a Supreme Court Judge to have the power to exercise this wide discretion, he having had many years of experience in the practice of the law, but it is quite another matter to confer such a power on a district judge, and more so `on a magistrate who may only have a few years practice and experience. Moreover, the new section 122 appears to confer powers, both on the Supreme Court and on subordinate courts, wider
/than the
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