Courts and Tribunals Bill (Second sitting)

Debate between Paul Kohler and Linsey Farnsworth

Committee stage
Wednesday 25th March 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Mr Paul Kohler (Wimbledon) (LD)]

Q Are you familiar with the argument of the retired Lord Justice of Appeal Sir Alan Moses, in The Guardian this week, that a third of the backlog could be cleared if we employed retired judges to undertake a winnowing exercise to clear the cases that will never come to court, and is he correct?

Claire Davies: I have not read that article, but if there is more judiciary, then there is more access for people. A lot of residents are taking the approach of looking at the outstanding cases, looking at the sorts of cases that may not go to trial, and bringing them in. As well as more judiciary to assist in that process, or to crack through the trials that there are, there would need to be the courtroom availability, and of course what has to come with more courtroom availability is staff so that the courts run efficiently. We would welcome retired judges to come back. There are many who currently sit in retirement in any event.

Caroline Goodwin: It would be absolutely brilliant to have these very senior judges come back. They have an absolute wealth of knowledge that they can bring. If they are prepared to operate in that role, it is a win-win situation. If we can instantly recruit more judiciary to deal with these cases, then it is something we should be proactively looking at.

[Linsey Farnsworth (Amber Valley) (Lab)]

Q It is fair to say that the CPS’s breadth of experience across the criminal justice system is unparalleled, given that it takes cases through the system, from advising the police at charge through to the magistrates court, the Crown court and the appeals court. Is it right that it is in a good position to understand the system fully, from start to finish?

Caroline Goodwin: It might understand the system, but it is about the application of the system. You may have a set of papers that comes in from the police and is sent to a reviewing lawyer—

--- Later in debate ---

[Linsey Farnsworth]

Q My last question is about the allocation process. In previous debates, we have heard concern that the judge’s allocation decision about whether it is the Crown court bench division or a jury trial would be a very long process. There would be a lot of work and a lot of written submissions, and it would take the judge a long time to make those decisions. That mirrors the process of the decisions that magistrates make every day, which, in my experience, often take three or four minutes to decide. The system would essentially require a defence advocate to argue for a higher sentence if they are pushing for a jury trial. Does that strike you as an unusual argument for a defence barrister to be making? Do you think the allocation process could actually be quite efficient?

Lord Burnett of Maldon: I have read some of these arguments, and I have been slightly surprised by them. I cannot help the old advocate in me thinking that lawyers are terribly good at finding nine reasons why you should not do something. We all did that; that is what lawyers are sometimes asked to do. I think this one will very much depend upon the procedures that are put in place for dealing with it.

Obviously, if you are going to create a new decision that has to be made, there will need to be adjustments to the practice direction and probably the criminal procedure rules, and I am not sure that detail has been thought through yet. If it has, I am not aware of it. I imagine that most of these decisions would be done on the papers. It strikes me as rather extravagant to suppose that you list it for half an hour for argument to deal with something like that, so I think that one is a bit of a bogeyman.

Sir Richard Henriques: Paper applications seem to me to be fairly obvious.

Clement Goldstone: Judges in the Crown court are very good at paper applications. They are used to them.

[Mr Kohler]

Q We all agree that the backlog is too great. Lord Burnett, in The Guardian this week retired Lord Justice of Appeal Sir Alan Moses argued that we could cut the backlog by a third in six months if we employed retired judges to winnow the current backlog. Do you agree? [Interruption.] Richard clearly does not.

Lord Burnett of Maldon: It is a very good journalistic article.

Unauthorised Entry to Football Matches Bill

Debate between Paul Kohler and Linsey Farnsworth

Committee stage
Wednesday 25th June 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Linsey Farnsworth]

The hon. Member is absolutely correct that in the modern day not many people have paper tickets. The Bill will apply equally to the electronic version, so I am grateful to him for allowing me to clarify.

[Mr Paul Kohler (Wimbledon) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Vickers. I have read paragraph 19 of the explanatory notes, but given the physicality of the description in the Bill, what is the legal justification for saying that it also covers electronic tickets? We can assume that it does, but I can see a defence barrister making a lot of the physicality in the description in proposed new section 1A(4) of the 1991 Act. There must be some legal reason why we can say absolutely that that description includes electronic tickets.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Kohler]

I raise the point, quietly, that the definition in the Bill does not include electronic tickets.

[Linsey Farnsworth]

I think I have got to the bottom of it. The Bill that has been printed for the Committee today is the old Bill, which has since been slightly amended to deal with that very point. That is why there is confusion, because I have a copy of the new version of the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

Linsey Farnsworth, can you respond?

[Linsey Farnsworth]

A ticket that has already been used? I am trying to remember; I think it goes back to the purpose of this change in the law and the desired effect of increased safety. If there is a valid ticket, there is a reserved seat, which is what I think the defence is getting at. The offence is being introduced to prevent overcrowding.

[Mr Kohler]

If someone is using a ticket that has already been used, it is an overcrowding issue, so is there a flaw in that change? The previous drafting made sense: if two people had a photocopy of the same ticket, and knowingly attempted to enter using that same ticket, that was not a defence under the original drafting, unless they reasonably believed that the ticket had not already been used. That has been removed in the final version, and I wonder whether that is a mistake in the drafting—I cannot see the logic of that.