Powers to search premises

The police can always search premises if the occupier consents to this. In addit
ion, Part
II of PACE (ss. 8 18) provides the police with statutory powers to enter and searc
h
premises for evidence. These powers can be executed either with or without a war
rant.
Search with a warrant
A number of statutes allow the granting of search warrants, but the main provisi
ons are
to be found in s. 8 of PACE. The police apply for the warrant to a magistrate, w
ho must
be satisfied that the police reasonably believe an indictable offence has been c
ommitted,
and that the premises concerned contain relevant evidence or material likely to
be
of substantial use to the investigation. In addition, it must be impractical to
make the
search without a warrant (which means with the consent of the person entitled to
grant entry or access to evidence), because:
l it is not practicable to communicate with that person;
l entry would not be granted without a warrant; or
l the purpose of the search would be frustrated or seriously prejudiced if immed
iate
entry could not be obtained on arrival.
The search warrant may allow entry to:
l specific premises;
l any premises occupied or controlled by the person specified on the application
;
l premises on more than one occasion. The number of entries may be specified or
unlimited.
The latter two search powers were created by the Serious Organised Crime and Pol
ice
Act 2005 and are known colloquially as super-warrants .
In practice, research by Lidstone (1984) indicates that magistrates rarely refus
e to
grant a warrant; if certain magistrates were known to refuse applications, the p
olice
would simply stop applying to them and go to another magistrate instead. About 1
2
per cent of searches are made with a warrant.
There are certain classes of material for which these basic powers cannot be use
d:
l privileged material (communications between lawyers and their clients);
l excluded material (medical records and journalistic material held in confidenc
e);
and