Victims of Sexual Violence: Court Delays
Warinder Juss Excerpts(2 days, 12 hours ago)
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Mary Glindon
It causes unnecessary and troublesome complexities for people who are already facing so much in their lives. We really cannot emphasise that enough.
In the final quarter of 2022, almost 70% of rape survivors withdrew from the justice system. The situation at present is nothing short of a crisis.
Warinder Juss (Wolverhampton West) (Lab)
It is estimated that the number of rape victims who pull out of prosecutions before trial has more than doubled in five years. One reason given is a shortage of lawyers—for both prosecution and defence—willing to take on rape and serious sexual assault cases, because they say that cases are becoming increasingly complex and that they are poorly paid in comparison with other areas of the law. Does my hon. Friend agree that it may be time for us to look at whether the lawyers doing this kind of work should be properly paid?
Mary Glindon
I hope that the review that will take place will look at everything and cover every aspect. I believe its aim is to be comprehensive and to bring justice and fairness to everybody involved in the system.
It is imperative that attention is drawn to the nature of postponements, which bear down on the already fragile mental health of victims. I have heard heartbreaking accounts of court dates being moved on the morning of the scheduled trial. Imagine waiting in anticipation for that day of justice, exerting every ounce of mental strength, just for it to be snatched away on the day of the trial. I invite colleagues to imagine that happening not once, but again and again.
There is also an important public safety element, which is too often overlooked. Many perpetrators are not placed on remand, and, when there is a delay to a case being heard, someone who could be guilty is walking the streets. Returning to the issue of fairness, there is a deep injustice to that: victims must look over their shoulder each and every day and have their lives put on hold, while perpetrators may be able to cling to their freedom for years.
I am cognisant that a number of factors have driven this enormous backlog, including the pandemic, industrial action by criminal barristers, a lack of capacity in the legal profession and an increase in the number of complex cases entering the system. While many of these factors are well known, it has also been brought to my attention that defence barristers may be able to generate a postponement by requesting a last-minute adjournment as a delay tactic. I would be grateful if the Minister committed to looking at that issue in more depth. We need greater scrutiny of last-minute adjournments, which are having such devastating impacts on victims.
In the summer, I wrote to the Justice Secretary on postponements and delays, and was grateful for the response that I received from the then Minister of State for Courts and Legal Services, my right hon. Friend the Member for Swindon South (Heidi Alexander), in which I was assured that reducing waiting times for victims of serious sexual offences is a priority for our Government. The Minister advised me that the Government were carefully considering the best way to fast-track rape cases, and were working with the judiciary to understand how that may be achieved. I would be grateful if the House received an update on the Government’s progress in delivering that manifesto commitment.
Oral Answers to Questions
Warinder Juss Excerpts(1 month, 1 week ago)
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Sir Ashley Fox (Bridgwater) (Con)
Warinder Juss (Wolverhampton West) (Lab)
The Minister of State, Ministry of Justice (Heidi Alexander)
We are funding 106,500 Crown court sitting days this financial year—500 days more than the previous Government originally agreed. To reduce the number of cases that end up at the Crown court, we are also extending magistrates’ sentencing powers to up to 12 months for an individual offence.
Heidi Alexander
We are currently operating 18 Nightingale courts in eight different locations, and we continue to recruit to the judiciary. The Conservatives cannot wash their hands of responsibility for the Crown court backlog. It was rising before covid. They closed more than 260 court buildings. They express concern now, but there was scant evidence of that in the 14 years they were in power.
Warinder Juss
Last week it was reported that the Crown court backlog is 71,000 cases, which could hit 100,000 unless radical action is taken. Some cases have not proceeded at all because of delays, includes those involving victims of serious offences such as rape, reinforcing that justice delayed is justice denied. I welcome the Chancellor’s Budget, confirming the significant financial investment in prison expansion and the Ministry of Justice funding settlement, which will increase Crown court sitting days. Does the Minister believe that the measures will be sufficient to reduce the Crown court backlog to an acceptable level, or does she envisage that further action will be necessary, such as increases to criminal legal aid?
Heidi Alexander
Legal aid is a vital part of the justice system, and it underpins our plans to build a justice system that works fairly for all parties. The previous Government left the civil and criminal legal aid markets in dire straits and facing significant challenges. We intend to publish our response shortly to the “Crime Lower” consultation, which relates to the fees paid to duty solicitors in police stations among other things, and we will follow up on that with our response to the Law Society’s successful judicial review of the previous Government’s decision on criminal legal aid fees.
Sentencing Review and Prison Capacity
Warinder Juss Excerpts(1 month, 3 weeks ago)
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Shabana Mahmood
Yes, I absolutely can. The whole point of the review is to ensure that the country is never again in a position in which we might run out of prison places, and to ensure that those who must be locked up to keep the public safe will always be locked up.
Warinder Juss (Wolverhampton West) (Lab)
Keeping a prisoner in prison costs the taxpayer over £50,000 a year, whereas punishing the prisoner out of prison costs less than £5,000 a year. What is more, the prisoner is then far less likely to reoffend. Does the Secretary of State agree that taxpayers’ money would be better spent on having a much cheaper and better alternative to prison?
Shabana Mahmood
My hon. Friend makes a really important point about the relative costs of imprisonment and of punishment out of prison. Delivering the 14,000 prison places that the previous Government failed to deliver is a big cost, but it will be met by this Government. We must also ensure that we expand punishment out of prison. All options must be pursued if we are to get to grips with this crisis.
Criminal Justice System: Capacity
Warinder Juss Excerpts(2 months ago)
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Shabana Mahmood
We will of course look at improved literacy and other skills within our prison estate. The problem with running a prison estate as hot as the previous Government did, and so full to the brim, is that when we are so badly overcrowded and prisoners are locked up for 23 hours every day, there is very little other work we can do to help prisoners rehabilitate. Dealing with the capacity crisis will enable us to have a better performance and better track record on rehabilitation, which is crucial if we are ultimately to reduce the number of victims in future and cut crime.
Warinder Juss (Wolverhampton West) (Lab)
Does the Secretary of State agree that failing to address the prisons capacity crisis and allowing the Crown court backlog to grow to unprecedented levels has meant that the entirety of our criminal justice system has been broken? I make particular reference to rape and serious sexual offences cases.
Shabana Mahmood
It is clear that the position I have inherited from my predecessors was shocking and completely unacceptable. We were, simply, one bad day away from total disaster in our criminal justice system. That is why, since we formed the Government, we have been making the difficult choices necessary to stabilise our criminal justice system and stabilise the situation in our prisons, so we can restore the system to one that the public can rightly have confidence in.