The effect of Schedule 21 on sentencing for manslaughter

Thesis

This thesis examines the origins of Schedule 21 and the intention behind it by making detailed recourse to Parliamentary debate on the passage of that statutory provision and other related ones. Based on that scrutiny, it contends the harm of death is to be treated as more serious than before. It asks by virtue of that principle whether the statutory sentencing guidelines for murder have implications for other crimes in a sentencing regime where the gravity of the crime is the sole desiderata for determining the length of adult custodial punishment. Finding they do, it fleshes out what those ramifications are, viz. that other crimes where the actus reus is death are subject to that increased valuation on the loss of life as a harm, translating into longer terms of imprisonment. Manslaughter is noted as anomalous in being a major homicide offence not subject to recent express legislative reform on this ground. The thesis then proceeds to investigate whether the aforementioned necessity has been adverted to and implemented in sentencing practice for manslaughter. It does so by analysing a substantial canon of case law, comparing sentencing levels and their justifications before and after the remit of Schedule 21. It finds that only recently has Sch.21’s true influence been appreciated by the Court of Appeal, and maps the journey to that point, asking why it was such a long one. It concludes that much is owed to the leadership of the Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) in the form of the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Judge for effecting overdue alterations to the sentencing levels for manslaughter. However it also points to the infancy of this epiphany, and identifies challenges and changes that still need to be made to deliver ordinal proportionality within this genus of harm, and questions ordinal proportionality between harm genuses, intending to explore this in subsequent research.

Authors: Mawhinney, G

• DOI: 10.5287/ora-nzandvarv
• Type of award: MSt
• Level of award: Masters
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford