Government plans to end trial by jury will do nothing to tackle the backlog of cases waiting to be heard. All it will do is take away one of the country’s basic fundamental human rights to be tried by your peers.
I’ve opposed the plan since the policy was first announced and that view has only been strengthened after being invited to spend a day with our local barristers at Chester Crown Court.
Government claims ending trial by jury for cases with an expected sentence of three years or less will reduce the 78,000 backlog of cases currently awaiting trial. There are around 1.3 million prosecutions in England and Wales every year, and 10 per cent of those cases go before a Crown Court. Of those, three out of 10 results in trials. The reforms appear to mean that more than two out of 10 will still go before a jury – therefore having little or no impact on numbers.
From conversations I had with local barristers and judges during my visit, it was clear that no one in government is listening to the legal profession. Not only did the barristers I met with not believe removing jury trials would bring down the backlog they also questioned why government chose three years given few crimes carry that sentence and they raised the very valid point about judges’ safety. A jury does not have to justify its verdict, but a judge will have to put their head above the parapet and decide a person’s fate alone. It’s also assumed judges will need to write up each decision, creating more work which in itself is counterproductive.
I was told the backlogs, which in some areas are a matter of months and others more than two and a half years, are caused by multiple factors including prisoner transportations (often impacted by lack of prison staff), whether a court is fully accessible (some are not wheelchair friendly), delays in waiting for reports that have been ordered and problems getting hostile witnesses to attend court.
I share these concerns and I raised these very points in a debate earlier this year but as expected, government dismissed the worries – despite not being able to provide any evidence as to how removing a jury would reduce the backlog. Since my visit I’ve written again to the Justice Secretary setting out the concerns of Cheshire barristers and judges and urged government to listen.
A one size fits all policy, and scrapping juries will not work and until each of these issues are tackled, there will be no movement in the backlog. The only thing removing trial by jury does is erode public trust in our justice system.
