Barry Sheerman
Main Page: Barry Sheerman (Labour (Co-op) - Huddersfield)Department Debates - View all Barry Sheerman's debates with the Ministry of Justice
(8 months ago)
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Mike Freer
I can reassure my hon. Friend that in Suffolk the disposals to March 2023 were up by 23% on the previous quarter, while the outstanding case loads slightly reduced in the same period. That reflects the hard work that is done with our partners to ensure that we get through the case load as fast as possible. We continue to work with the judiciary to identify how we can get the high workload moving more smoothly. Across the Department, and working with our partners, the Crown court improvement group continues to look at best practice and the local criminal justice board will always look at best practice across the country to see what we can do to ensure that his area continues to perform.
Mr Barry Sheerman (Huddersfield) (Lab/Co-op)
Is the Minister aware that the criminal courts are full of cases relating to joint enterprise, a terrible miscarriage of justice? Will he and the Justice team promise to meet me and the campaigning group JENGbA—Joint Enterprise Not Guilty by Association—to see whether we can clear the justice system of the many people who should never have been in the courts?
Mike Freer
The hon. Gentleman has campaigned on that issue for some time, and I have met his colleague, the hon. Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor), to discuss it. The data collection does not support the identification of cases relating to joint enterprise, but I understand that the Crown Prosecution is now doing an exercise on better data collection to see whether the issue that he continues to raise, quite rightly, is borne out by the data, and we can see what action we might take to address any injustices.