Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of allowing single justice procedure hearings to be observable by accredited journalists.

Single Justice Procedure (SJP) cases are decided by a single magistrate, with support of a legal adviser, in private rather than in a hearing in open court. This means that cases can be dealt with by courts anywhere in the country and are therefore not scheduled in the same way as conventional cases in court proceedings. As a result of this, these cases can be decided quickly and are often used to fill gaps between in person hearings and so enable efficient use of magistrates’ court capacity and time. Magistrates have the ability to refer cases to open court if they feel it would be appropriate.

Although journalists cannot observe magistrates deciding individual SJP cases, there is already more information published on SJP cases than cases heard in open court. This allows scrutiny from journalists, who can request additional information on cases under the Criminal Procedure Rules. Under a protocol agreed between HMCTS and media organisations, magistrates’ courts must provide lists of both pending cases and copies of the court register to local media. This includes SJP cases. The protocol also outlines what documents relating to SJP cases can be provided to the media – unlike any other case type, this includes a copy of the prosecution statement of facts or, if there is no statement of facts, the witness statement(s) and any defence representations in mitigation. We will keep the procedure under review.