XN000022-1995-07-19 — Page 46

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I have consulted my colleague the Secretary for Health and Welfare, who has policy responsibility for the legislation involved, and the Director of Social Welfare, and I can on their behalf give an assurance that the assignment of supervising officers to females will be handled in the way proposed by members of the Bills Committee.

Criminal libel

Another concern raised by the Bills Committee related to criminal libel. The Bill proposes to repeal the offence under section 6 of the Defamation Ordinance of maliciously publishing a defamatory libel. This offence can be committed by a person with no intention to defame, and it is no defence to show that the statement was true. Some members of the Bills Committee also favoured repealing section 5 of the Defamation Ordinance, which relates to persons who publish a defamatory libel knowing it to be false. It was argued that a civil law remedy is adequate to deal with such publications.

The Administration considers that there may be good reasons for retaining section 5. Many other common law jurisdictions have such an offence, and a civil remedy may not be adequate in some situations. However, it was not possible, at the end of this legislative session, for either the Administration or the Bills Committee to consider fully the advantages and disadvantages of retaining the provision. It was therefore agreed that the issue should not be resolved in the context of this Bill, but should be considered next session by this Council's Panel on Administration of Justice and Legal Services. I am grateful to members of the Bills Committee for agreeing to this course of action.

Offences relating to children

Mr President, I now turn to the Committee Stage amendments that I will be moving later on today. One amendment that will be of general public interest and has relevance to the immediately preceeding debate is the proposed increase in penalties for two offences relating to children. Concern over the inadequacy of the existing penalties was widely expressed after a particular case of ill-treatment to a child was recently prosecuted.

Section 26 of the Offences against the Person Ordinance creates an offence of unlawfully abandoning or exposing a child under the age of 2 years in such a way that the life of the child is endangered or the health of the child is likely to be permanently injured. The current penalty is imprisonment for 3 years. It is proposed to amend the section so that, on conviction on indictment, the penalty is imprisonment for 10 years and, on summary conviction, the penalty is imprisonment for 3 years.