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Objects and Reasons,
The object of this Ordinance is to bring the law of the Colony on the subject of punishments into line with the law of England. It accomplishes this first, by abolishing minimum penalties, and thus gives the Judge the power of dealing leniently with cases which deserve to be so treated.
The Ordinance also does away with the confusion and redundancy of language which now exist in the penalty clauses of the Criminal Laws of the Colony. In the English Acts, from which our laws have been copied, there were alternative penalties provided of penal servitude for a maximum and minimum term (which was usually three years), and imprisonment with or without hard labour for not more than two years. The Criminal Law Ordinances, as originally passed, followed this form of alternative pen- alty. By Ordinance No. 3 of 1887, penal servitude was abolished, and imprisonment with hard labour substituted for it. In the Ordinances as they appear in the Revised Edition, "imprisonment with bard labour" has been sub- stituted for " 'peual servitude"; but no further change was made, with the result, as in the "example" given in s. 7, that the alternatives became "imprisonment with hard labour for not more than 14 and not less than 3 years and imprisonment with or without hard labour for not more than 2 yours". This is meaningless and the Or- dinauce eliminates the second alternative. It should be noted that the penalty of imprisonment with or without hard labour" as an alternative to penal servitude has been eliminated in England, but by a different process.
4
The use of "examples" is based on Indian legislation, and due recognition of it will be made in the new
"Inter- pretation Ordinance now being drafted.
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A further effective change is made by making the pen- alty of imprisonment always subject to the discretionary with or without hard labour" (as it is in fact in the majority of cases) unless any Ordinance expressly provides otherwise. This is made to apply to future enactments, and will make the drafting of Ordinances uniform.
and
The superfluous words "at the discretion of the Court"
on conviction thereof are eliminated.
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The result of these changes so far as mere revision is concerned will be to reduce the bulk of the criminal laws
of 185, by at least one-third, But the more important result will be to let each offence clearly appear, and to condense the penalty clauses as much as possible, leaving them to be governed by the general principles laid down by this Ordinance.
The schedule makes correspending alterations in the other Criminal Ordinances, The changes effected in Part II are in Ordinances where the penalty is in this form-"impri- sonment with hard labour for three years, or imprisonment with or without hard labour for not more than two years In these cases the "three years" is not an absolute penalty because there is an alternative, and therefore the alteration is warranted.
Solitary confinement is a prison disciplinary measure and it is unusual for it to be put within the province of the Court to impose it as part of the original sentence; it is therefore proposed to delete the words "with or with- out solitary confinement" wherever they occur. This has been done with the concurrence of the Police and Prison authorities.
The schedule carries the amendments down to the stage at which the Revision Manuscript has at present arrived, In due course, as the Revision proceeds, legislation will be introduced adding other Ordinances to the different Parts of the schedule.
Three other clauses have been introduced, sections 10, 11 and 12, which deal with old, cumbersome, and out of date expressions, substituting therefor modern formulas.
It is not proposed that the Ordinance should come into force until the Council has sanctioned the New Edition as the authoritative version of the Ordinances of the Colony.
F. T. PIGGOTT, Chief Justice.