Status: We will commence work on this project in winter 2012, with the aim of presenting a scoping paper in autumn 2013. The Ministry of Justice has asked the Commission to carry out a scoping exercise as a first step towards a project to reform the law on offences against the person
The Offences Against the Person Act 1861 is widely recognised as being outdated. It uses archaic language and follows a Victorian approach of listing separate offences for individual factual scenarios, many of which are no longer necessary (for example, the offence under section 17 of impeding a person endeavouring to save himself from a shipwreck).
The structure of the Act is also unsatisfactory; there is no clear hierarchy of offences and the differences between sections 18, 20 and 47 are not clearly spelt out. Section 20 (maliciously wounding or inflicting grievous bodily harm) is seen as more serious than section 47 (assault occasioning actual bodily harm) but the maximum penalty (five years) is the same. Furthermore the actus reus for sections 18 (intentionally wounding or causing grievous bodily harm) and 20 appear to be the same apart from the distinction between “causing” and “inflicting”, which is notoriously difficult to draw.
This project will therefore aim to restructure the law on offences against the person, probably by creating a structured hierarchy of offences, as well as modernising and simplifying the language by which these offences are defined. A further possibility would be to tie this new hierarchy of offences to mode of trial in order to clear up some of the procedural discrepancies.
