For each numbered blank in the following passage, there are four choices marked [A], [B], [C] and [D]. Choose the best one and mark your answer on ANSWER SHEET 1 by blackening the corresponding letter in the brackets with a pencil. (10 points)
The government is to ban payments to witnesses by newspapers seeking to buy up people involved in prominent cases __31__ the trial of Rosemary West.
In a significant __32__ of legal controls over the press, Lord Irvine, the Lord Chancellor, will introduce a __33__ bill that will propose making payments to witnesses __34__ and will strictly control the amount of __35__ that can be given to a case __36__ a trial begins.
In a letter to Gerald Kaufman, chairman of the House of Commons Media Select Committee, Lord Irvine said he __37__ with a committee report this year which said that self regulation did not __38__ sufficient control.
__39__ of the letter came two days after Lord Irvine caused a __40__ of media protest when he said the __41__ of privacy controls contained in European legislation would be left to judges __42__ to Parliament.
The Lord Chancellor said introduction of the Human Rights Bill, which __43__ the European Convention on Human Rights legally __44__ in Britain, laid down that everybody was __45__ to privacy and that public figures could go to court to protect themselves and their families.
“Press freedoms will be in safe hands __46__ our British judges,” he said.
Witness payments became an __47__ after West was sentenced to 10 life sentences in 1995. Up to 19 witnesses were __48__ to have received payments for telling their stories to newspapers. Concerns were raised __49__ witnesses might be encouraged to exaggerate their stories in court to __50__ guilty verdicts.
