mordant wit

Women who are raped while drunk face losing the chance to bring their attackers to justice after a legal ruling on the eve of new licensing laws.

A High Court judge yesterday threw out the case of a student who claimed that she was raped while drunk and unconscious on the basis that “drunken consent is still consent”.

The judgment came hours before the sweeping relaxation of Britain licensing laws which introduces 24-hour drinking in pubs for the first time.

The change prompted police and doctors to warn that Britain was facing an explosion of binge drinking.

The prosecution in the rape case had said it could not go on after the woman admitted that she could not remember whether she gave consent or not or whether sex had taken place. The jury at Swansea Crown Court was told: “Drunken consent is still consent.”