5.
The Governors of these territories all confirmed as
recently as April 1973 that there had been no change in the
attitudes of the Legislatures concerned.
II Procedure for the Exercise of the Prerogative of hercy
6. In 1969 partly as an extension of the request to Governments of Dependent Territories to consider the abolition
of capital punishment, and partly as a result of difficulties
over a particular petition for mercy from the Bahamas, the then
Secretary of State directed that the entire policy and procedure
for the exercise of the Prerogative of "ercy should be reviewed
in depth.
7.
A Committee of senior FCO officials deliberated for over
a year, and reviewed all aspects of policy and procedure both in
the Dependent Territories and in the United Kingdom in consultation with the Home Office. The Committee recommended, and the then
Secretary of State agreed, that on legal, constitutional and
political grounds, the existing procedure originally formulated
in 1947 by Mr Arthur Creech-Jones, the then Secretary of State
for the Colonies, should be reaffirmed. The essential feature
of this procedure is that the Governor of a Dependent Territory has undivided responsibility for the exercise of the delegated
Royal Prerogative of Mercy, and that when a condemned man
petitions beyond the Governor to Her Majesty the Secretary of State will always advise Her Majesty not to intervene, except
in the very rare case of an apparent miscarriage of justice.
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