Criminal Court Reform

Brian Mathew Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd December 2025 Commons Chamber

[Mr Lammy]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Demand is soaring. Quite rightly, we are asking our police to arrest more, and we all know that smartphones, DNA, and phenotyping to tell the colour of a person’s eyes increase the workload. We have to reform the system, or we will break it.

[Brian Mathew (Melksham and Devizes) (LD)]

Justice delayed is indeed justice denied, but we have a proud history of juries in this country. If juries are to be suspended for cases in which a sentence of less than three years is expected in order to clear the backlog, will that just be for a limited time, and when will normal jury service be resumed?

[Mr Lammy]

For the reasons of complexity that Sir Brian has set out, and because the process of passing legislation means that I think we will only see the numbers starting to fall by the next general election, no, this change has to be permanent.