Courts and Tribunal Services (England and Wales)

Marie Rimmer Excerpts

Thursday 17th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Marie Rimmer (St Helens South and Whiston) (Lab)]

I want first to thank the Minister for the courtesy and quickness of his response to my first communication—there is another one on the way. I will not repeat what many Members have said, because we are all anxious to get on and there is not much time.

Magistrates in my area have expressed exactly the same concerns about local people serving local justice with their knowledge and expertise. There are serious concerns about the accuracy and quality of the communications in the consultation. In September 2014, the Department for Transport closed the transport direct planner tool used in the impact assessment to calculate travel times by car and public transport, and the methodology for calculations has not been publicised as part of the consultation. It is calculated that the 14-mile journey from St Helens court will take 45 minutes. That takes no account of peak times, delays, parking, or getting to the court in the city centre. There is no car park nearby. People have to travel within the town centre to get a train out to Liverpool and then walk across the city or get another mode of travel. The travel network is not described accurately in the documentation.

The consultation document states that the court was utilised at approximately 62% capacity, but that figure has been seriously challenged. The council is having difficulty getting time allocated to court cases due to the lack of capacity in the courts. There have been some very serious incidents that have bothered me. The youth offending service is required to attend the local youth court frequently. Some parents and carers are not able, capable or willing to attend with their child for a variety of reasons. The situation is likely to be exacerbated if cases are to be heard in Liverpool. When St Helens custody suite was recently closed temporarily while £1.7 million was being spent on remodelling it, young people had to go across to Merseyside. The youth offending service was called on even more because an appropriate adult had to be found for those children. It is likely that more warrants will need to be issued due to failures to attend. This could result in young people being arrested and possibly detained overnight in police custody. That will be evident on their criminal record and may impact on future bail applications.

Residents and other stakeholders will have to travel to and from Liverpool, at additional expense time. As I said, £1.7 million was spent on redeveloping the court, and it is still only just about finished. It is highly suitable for such cases, having more capacity. Even with the figure in the document of 62% usage, which we challenge, its capacity is larger than that of another court that is being kept open. Equally importantly, the courts that it is proposed stay open are within 5 miles of Liverpool city centre court. There are also Birkenhead and Bootle, which are 5 miles and 3.2 miles away. They both have direct rail links into the city centre, with journeys every eight minutes taking about three minutes, while we would not be able to get to Liverpool Crown court within an hour. There are very serious concerns about the quality of the information in the documentation.

The Justice Minister is being done an injustice. His courtesy has been exemplary in the responses to us. I urge him to look at the consultation document again to ensure that the information is accurate, and that justice can be seen to be done and and transparent for all.