Justice for Victims of Crime

1. What recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the Crown Prosecution Service in ensuring access to justice for victims of crime.

4. What recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of the Crown Prosecution Service in ensuring access to justice for victims of crime.

The CPS is improving access to justice for victims through its victim transformation programme. Together with measures in the Victims and Prisoners Bill, this will help to ensure access to justice for all victims of crime.

In October 2021, the Government made the not hugely ambitious pledge to reduce the size of the Crown court backlog within four years. The latest figures published last week show that the backlog is now almost 2,900 cases higher than when they started. Will the Solicitor General explain what new steps the Government will take to meet their target, as what they have been doing so far clearly is not working?

The hon. Lady raises an important issue. One method being used is sentencing blitzes, whereby sentences are being lined up back-to-back to ensure that cases are completed as quickly as possible.

The Ministry of Justice’s early legal advice pilot scheme has just reported. It ran for five months, cost £5 million and supported a sum total of just three people. Instead of the Attorney General and the Government trying to reinvent the wheel by making it square, why do they not deliver better access to justice by supporting more people through legal aid?

In terms of access to justice for victims, I mentioned the victim transformation programme, which is vital in supporting victims. It will transform how the CPS communicates with victims and ensure that those with specific needs have enhanced support.

The victims’ right to review makes it easier for victims to seek a review of a CPS decision not to bring charges. Will the Minister congratulate CPS East Midlands on having the victims’ right to review prominent on the front page of its website? Is he satisfied that the scheme is being rolled out satisfactorily across the country?

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising this issue. He will be pleased to know that on the law tour, the Attorney General and I saw CPS East Midlands for ourselves, and he is right. It is also right to acknowledge that the vast majority of cases are performed correctly and accurately. Of those that are not, it is right to say that 243 decisions were found to be incorrect and were reviewed last year.