TNAG-2084-FCO40-2969-Death-penalty-in-Hong-Kong-1990 — Page 144

his meeting of 18 February to consider a capital

punishment case in Bermuda, the Secretary of State said

3.

that we should keep in mind the possibility of adding a

clause to the Criminal Justice Bill to amend the

Creech-Jones doctrine under which Governors take sole

responsibility for exercising the Prerogative of Mercy in

those Dependent Territores which still retain capital

punishment. The department have been told by the Home

Office that the Bill based upon the White Paper "Crime,

Justice and Protecting the Public" is now being prepared,

and that instructions to Counsel are to issue before the

summer break with a view to introducing the Bill in the

next session during the last week of November.

A

C

4. In recent years Ministers have considered every

possible aspect of the capital punishment issue. Advice

from officials and from the law officers has

by

concistently argued that the best solution on legal

grounds would be the abolition of capital punishment

primary legislation in the British Parliament. No other

course is free of practical or constitutional objections

the charge that of misleading Parliament if, for

instance, w

we were to attempt instructing Governors to

or

commute in every case.

5. Business managers are unlikely to find sufficient

parliamentary time to introduce a separate Bill for

abolition even if this were judged politically feasible.

Since abolition in the UK was achieved by a free vote it

might be considered contentious for the government to