It has taken a courageous schoolgirl, a victim of a serious indecent assault, to step forward to highlight a glaring inadequacy in the law.

Identity parades have always been a contentious issue.

The decision whether or not to take part in a line-up

is left with the alleged perpetrator of the crime or his legal representative. Even then the police have to go out and find, and pay, volunteers to stand alongside the suspect.

Yet it is felt that it is worth the efforts as a positive identification is regarded as key evidence. If an identification fails, other avenues are open to the police but are not as effective.

All well and good, but what makes the process a nonsense is the acceptance that the suspect is able to radically change their appearance. If it weren't so serious it would make a Pythonesque sketch, with all taking part being issued with false eyebrows, glasses, noses and a moustache.

The victim whose story we tell today is understandably angry and frustrated by the issues. She wants the law changed.

It is worth looking once more at her statement - 'Of course the pain and misery that comes after an attack is never going to go away...' We can't make it go away. But what we can do is give her all of the support we can muster and back her petition in a bid to make her wish come true.

Even if the law cannot be changed it will give her and other victims like her the knowledge that thousands of people share her view.

We have a law designed to protect the criminal and do nothing for the victim.

As Mr Bumble says: 'If the law supposes that...the law is an ass-a idiot'

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.