Carry on Criminal Justice
It is hard to imagine how the administration of justice could get any worse with many court rooms shut and trials being put off now until 2028.
Yesterday at our local Magistrates Court our client, a woman of exemplary good character attended for her trial in relation to domestic allegations of assault.
She is not originally from this country and required an interpreter. The effect of these proceedings had meant she had been denied custody of her child for nearly a year.
We were instructed privately and Counsel attended on her behalf.
When Counsel attended our local court, she was initially informed that there was no Chair of the Bench. When lay magistrates sit ( usually 2 or 3 ) one acts as chair and has had specific training to do so.
Consequently, the court could not sit. Although it sounds hilarious, when the court clerk indicated there was no Chair, another court colleague misunderstood this and collected a chair (furniture) from another court room to bring it into the court. This, sadly was not sufficient to solve the problem.
A Chair of the Bench could not be found until 11.20 that morning. A court without judges is not really a court at all.
Additionally, in the same court, a man apparently appeared for the sixth time for driving without insurance, again with no interpreter booked which he required. For the same matter he had had to come to court 6 times. The court clerk was compelled to try and deal with this matter by way of google translate
.
Added to this, another trial was listed on the same day in the same court involving an allegation of a sexual offence and so therefore this took precedence and as the court could not sit until 11.20, our client’s trial was non effective
Much of the above will be familiar to colleagues. What is a real worry is that whilst this is going on somewhere in Petty France the respected Sir Brian Leveson is devising schemes that will allow Magistrates greater powers to deal with more cases and possibly create an intermediary court using magistrates and Judges.
Bearing in mind the tale I have outlined above, one is hardly filled with confidence that the Magistrates Courts are going to be delegated more powers bearing in mind the frequent car crashes which occur at the courts as set out above.
The message that is being received is because of the courts backlog, the only way to deal with the problem is to restrict the right to having a trial at the Crown Court.
In other words, years of underfunding by the Conservative Government will basically lead to a substantial restriction of the right of the accused to be tried by their peers. That sounds fair!!!
Ministers and probably Sir Brian will tell you there is no choice.
However, that might not be the case, because one of the differences now is that people in the criminal defence profession are leaving in their droves.
A recent Criminal Bar Association survey indicated that a third of the Bar wanted to leave. The number of duty solicitors are reducing with every new rota that is issued.
Soon there will not be enough people to do the job.
Some advocates are already saying they will not in cases where the accused’s right to elect trial by jury has been curtailed. The consequence of that would be more unrepresented defendants in courts facing more serious allegations adding to the chaos in court.
Any reforms will be redundant if there are insufficient lawyers to service the changes.
Perhaps it is time for the Government to fill those empty court rooms properly, to ensure there are enough staff to run the courts, to make sure there are proper facilities for court users and then we might be able to think about a return to a justice system we are proud of.
