ABSTRACT
Different approaches to the rule against hearsay have been taken in civil and criminal proceedings. The Civil Evidence Act 1995 boldly enacts in s 1(1) that ‘in civil proceedings evidence shall not be excluded on the ground that it is hearsay’. In criminal proceedings the law is governed by Part 11, Chapter 2 of the CJA 2003. This does not abolish the rule against hearsay. Instead, it defines the rule and codifies the exceptions; but it achieves the latter task in a half-hearted way by preserving a number of existing common law exceptions. At least for criminal trials it is necessary to understand the scope of the rule, because it would be absurd to develop an argument that evidence should be included as a hearsay exception if the rule does not apply in the first place. It is necessary to concentrate on two features in order to understand the scope of the rule: the definitions of ‘statement’ and ‘a matter stated’, and the purpose for which evidence of an out-of-court statement is being adduced.
