TNAG-0030-FCO40-66-Relations-with-China-1968 — Page 67

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Reference...

(2)

Mr. Carter

On reflection I am not very happy about the references in the draft to release on license and have discussed the matter with Sir Francis Herchenroder and with Mr. Shuffrey, an

Assistant Secretary in the Criminal Department of the Home Office.

2.

The provisions for release on license in the Criminal Justice Act and also, I am confident, in all the colonial ordinances which provide for it, are

(a)

concerned only with the treatment of offenders who have received relatively long sentences, and

(b) provide for release on license only after a

substantial proportion of the sentence has been served.

I believe that in all the colonial ordinances the provisions

for release on licence of adult prisoners are intended to afford special facilities for dealing with habitual offenders or recidivists and this is the origin of the system in this country. The object was:

(a)

to enable the court to impose a long sentence on a prisoner who had committed an offence for which

a lesser sentence would normally be imposed if, according to various tests, the offender qualified as an habitual offender.

Such an offender could be released on license, after, say, a third of his sentence had been served. After release he would remain under sentence for the rest of the period laid down by the court and could be taken back to prison without' trial by the Minister (Home Secretary in this country) if he broke any of the conditions of the license during the remainder of the sentence. During the period of release the prisoner was required to report regularly to the police (in colonies) or was under statutory after care by a probation officer in the United Kingdom and perhaps also in a few colonies.

3. In Hong Kong I take it that the kinds of prisoners you now have in mind are not habitual criminals of the kind for which the system of release on license was elsewhere intended. Some of them may not have received very long-sentences (i.e. more than say, six months) and you may wish to provide for their release before so long a period as one year or a third of the sentence (as in England under the 1967 Act) has been served.

It was because I assumed that the ordinary system of release on license might not really be what was required in the special circumstances of Hong Kong that I suggested to Mr. Gaminara that what might really be more suitable would be release by the Governor under Article VX of the Letters Patent. This, of course, could still be used but, unless a special law was passed, it would not be possible to provide any sanction to deal with the released prisoner who broke any of the conditions under which he might have been released.

5.

:

It seems to me that, if the idea of release on license is to be pursued in Hong Kong, an entirely new system would be needed This would

/(a)