New Section 2 (1A) provides that the authorities entitled to make such a request are:

"(a) the Attorney-General of the Isle of Man, Jersey or Guernsey, acting under legislation corresponding to section 1 of this Act and having effect in the Island whose Attorney-General makes the request; and

(b) the Secretary of State acting under section 4(2A) of the [1990 Act], in response to a request received by him from an overseas court, tribunal or authority ("an overseas authority") ."

section 1 of the 1987 Act is the section by which the Serious Fraud Office is set up. This Court has not been shown any legislation of Guernsey corresponding to section 1 of the 1987 Act.

The reference to section 4(2A) of the 1990 Act is to that section as amended also by section 164 of the 1994 Act. The effect of section 4(2A) is to add to the existing power of the Secretary of State to nominate a court to receive relevant evidence by virtue of section 4(2), a power to refer a request from overseas to the Director of the Serious Fraud Office for him to obtain relevant evidence in response to the request, provided that it appears to the Secretary of State that "the request relates to an offence involving serious or complex fraud". The form of section 4(2A) is similar to that of section 4(2), and in particular the Secretary of State "may, if he thinks fit" exercise the power to refer the overseas request to the Director, that is to say, the Secretary of State can in a similar way make the necessary governmental assessment of the national interests of the United Kingdom as part of the process of deciding whether or not to act on the request from the foreign requesting State.