Closed petition Update the law on murder and incorporate the offence into statutory law

Closed on 10 November 2021

The Government should set out the common law offence of murder in statute, which should make it clear that someone should only be charged with murder if they had an intent to take a life. Mandatory life sentences should also be revoked, with a tier system similar to Canada and the US.

The current law is inaccessible to the general public and is not fair to require courts to give a mandatory life sentence. Mandatory life sentences do not adequately allow for sentencing to reflect individual circumstances. Further, treating intended GBH that results in death as murder rather than manslaughter is not fair, as they had no intention to commit murder.