ABSTRACT
One of the basic freedoms secured by English law, and now reinforced by the Human Rights Act 1998,67 is that no one can be forced to answer questions or produce documents which may incriminate him or her in subsequent criminal proceedings. Lord Browne-Wilkinson explained in Re Arrows (No 4)68 that the principle has evolved from the abhorrence felt for the procedures of the Star Chamber, under which the prisoner was forced, by the use of torture, to answer self-incriminating questions on the basis of which he or she was subsequently convicted. Balancing this freedom with the need in civil proceedings to discover what has happened to property obtained by fraud has proved problematic.
