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Wednesday, June 20, 1973
He said the bill was supported by the unofficials, but they recommended
that it should be reviewed within two years to see whether it could be allowed
to lapse and the additional jurisdiction relinquished.
Under the legislation, the maximum sentence which may be imposed by
a District Judge is raised from five to seven years. This is to enable the
court to deal more adequately with some of the more serious cases, presently
tried in the Supreme Court, to be tried in the District Court.
During the Committee Stage of the Criminal Procedure Bill, Mr. Woo
introduced two amendments (which were incorporated into the legislation), one
restricting its operation to a list of scheduled offences, and another that
altered the conditions set out in a new section which have to be met before a
person can be sentenced to preventive detention.
"All in all," he said, "there should be adequate safeguards against
abuse of the section."
Another unofficial member, the Hon. Hilton Cheong-Leen also supported
the bill but expressed reservation about the preventive detention system.
He noted that the system had not been particularly successful in
England, He hoped, however, that because of different social conditions,
it would be successful in Hong Kong if it was handled with care.
He also hoped that the provisions in the bill would enable the
government to clamp down on drug pushers thus stopping them from leading
young people to drugs.
The Hon. Wilfred Wong gave strong support to the bill. He reasoned that
"fairness to the individual should be weighed against fairness to society", and
that hardened criminals should be detained in the interest of society as a whole,
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