records would have been admissible and where the person who supplied the information contained in the record was dead, beyond the seas, unfit, could not with reasonable diligence be traced, or could not reasonably be expected to have any recollection of the matters dealt with in the information he supplied. This statutory exception to the hearsay rule could be seen as an extension of the long established common law rule which admits the declarations of deceased persons acting under a duty to do an act and record it in the ordinary course of business. However, the principal flaw in the Criminal Evidence Act 1965 was that it was restricted to business
