linguistic:paraphrasing
Testimonial privilege

Distinguishing Leach, the Court of Criminal Appeal held in R v Lapworth (1930) that a wife was nevertheless a compellable witness for the prosecution in cases of personal violence against her, on the basis that the common law position prior to the 1898 Act had not been affected by the Act. However, in Hoskyn v Metropolitan Police Commissioner (1978) the House of Lords overruled Lapworth, ending the personal violence exception, ruling that spouses are competent but not compellable witnesses for the prosecution in all cases, thus restoring the 1912 decision in Leach. In reaching this view, judges were swayed by the special status of marriage, and the "natural repugnance" that the public would feel at seeing a wife give evidence against her husband in a wide range of scenarios.