TNAG-1732-FCO40-2445-Minutes-and-Hansards-of-the-Legislative-Council-of-Hong-Kong-1988 — Page 190

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Appeal against the decision of the Attorney General to apply for an order of transfer or the order itself is prohibited under cause 5.

SEVELL

An obligation is placed on the Attorney General under lauses 6 and 8 to deliver a summary of evidence and an indictment to the Registrar, also within days of the date of stet set the order transfer. This means that the High Court will have before it documents to enable it to decide what procedure should be adopted to deal with the transferred case.

Clause 9 introduces the element of judicial discretion

in the application of the new procedures. Under the White Bill Now, where the preparatory hearing would have been compulsory.

it appears to a judge that the indictment and the summary of evidence reveal a case of fraud, or dishonesty in a commercial context, of such seriousness and complexity that substantial benefits are likely to accrue from a preparatory hearing, he may order such a hearing. In other words, a judge needs to be satisfied that it is a case of the type and seriousness that requires the application of special procedures.

And

The objects of the preparatory hearing set out in Cause 9 reproduce those proposed by the Select Committee which

I have already explained.

Where a judge decides to hold a preparatory hearing the trial commences with that hearing. His decision is not subject to appeal. The accused may plead to the indictment at the commencement of the preparatory hearing or defer his plea so long

And those provisions are set out in as he pleads before the jury is empanelled. Clauses 10, 11 and 12 contain these provisions.

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If the judge does not order a preparatory hearing, the

trial will proceed in the usual way. The judge also has a

discretion to decide what steps should be taken and how much of

the new procedure should be adopted in a particular preparatory hearing.

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