XN000022-1995-03-28 — Page 11

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ICC panels to meet

The four panels of the Infrastructure Co-ordinating Committee will meet in Beijing for preliminary discussions.

The panel on Marine Channels will meet on March 30, the Roads and Bridges panel and the Air Traffic Control panel on March 31, and the Railway panel on April

4.

End/Tuesday, March 28, 1995

Bills to enhance protection for vulnerable witnesses

Two bills aiming to protect and assist vulnerable witnesses in giving evidence in criminal proceedings were approved by the Governor-in-Council today (Tuesday).

A Government spokesman said today that the two bills, the Criminal Procedure (Amendment) Bill 1995 and the Evidence (Amendment) Bill 1995, would be introduced to the Legislative Council on April 19.

The proposed legislation was based on the recommendations made by the Committee on Evidence of Children in Criminal Proceedings, the Working Party on Mentally Handicapped People Giving Evidence in Court and the Fight Crime Committee, he said.

The legislation will give effect to the scheme on vulnerable witnesses outlined in the Attorney General's Policy Commitments issued in October last year.

The spokesman said that the Evidence (Amendment) Bill 1995, which applied to children giving evidence in criminal proceedings, sought to remove the presumption of a child's incompetence to testify and abolish a rule of evidence which had been described by one judge as a "child molester's" charter.

Under the existing law, he said, children under seven years old were generally incompetent to testify, and a child who understood the duty of speaking the truth but did not understand the nature of the oath might only give unsworn evidence, which, without corroboration, was not sufficient to convict an offender.