Trials: Timeliness

Question

Asked by

To ask His Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the length of time between charging suspects and trials taking place.

My Lords, as of June 2025, the average time from charge to the main hearing in the Crown Court, whether that is a guilty plea or a contested trial, for all Crown Court cases is 241 days. That is 14 fewer days than in the corresponding quarter last year, a drop of 5%, so there is some improvement, but overall the Crown Court backlog that the Government inherited continues to rise, which means that victims are waiting too long for justice. The Government commissioned Sir Brian Leveson to propose reforms. We are carefully considering his report and will respond in due course.

I thank the Minister for that Answer, but defence companies, the MoD and businesses they work with were attacked by Palestine Action almost 400 times before it was proscribed. This is an industry of huge strategic importance; it keeps our country safe and is helping to defend Ukraine. These attacks intimidate workers and put jobs at risk. Police have been injured. These cases were already straining the justice system. Trials are taking years to reach court. That creates a perception that serious offences go unpunished, and that could encourage more attacks. What can the Government do to speed things up in these cases?

I am grateful to the noble Lord for raising this important issue. Palestine Action has conducted an escalating campaign involving alleged criminal damage to Britain’s national security infrastructure, intimidation and violence. This Government unreservedly condemn any crimes of this kind. That said, as the noble Lord will understand, it would be wrong for me to comment on individual cases that are awaiting trial. In relation to when trials take place, in the same way that no Government can tell the Crown Prosecution Service which cases to prosecute, this Government do not tell courts which cases to prioritise when listing trials. These are decisions for independent judges to make, free from political pressure.

My Lords, the Minister will remember from her time as a Crown Court judge that the time between a case first coming before a Crown Court and being listed for trial has got longer and longer. Now, perhaps in her old court, trials are being listed for 2028 and 2029. This is unacceptable for victims, for witnesses and even for the defendant. It requires some will and leadership to crack this. What are the Government intending to do about it? The 1,250 extra days promised to the system by the Lord Chancellor just the other day could be taken up by her old court alone in one year. Please let us have some action.

I could not agree more with the basic premise of the noble and learned Lord’s question. It is simply unacceptable, and behind every one of those statistics are human beings waiting for justice. Our immediate reactions are that we intend to fund a record high of 111,250 sitting days in the Crown Court, to free up an additional 2,000 days in the Crown Court by extending the sentencing powers of the magistrates’ courts from six to 12 months, and to make some capital investment. But it is obvious to everybody that simply making efficiencies and putting financial help into the system will not deal with the problem. The backlog is now twice what it was before Covid, which is why the Government asked Sir Brian Leveson to look at fundamental reforms of how the system works. We are considering those and will respond in due course.

My Lords, we all accept that there is no magic bullet to reduce trial delays to acceptable levels, but does the noble Baroness agree that the most important factor is indeed the number of Crown Court sitting days? Unless prosecutions have to be abandoned—which does happen because of delays—all these cases need to be tried eventually, so there is no saving of resources by delaying trials. What steps do the Government have in mind specifically to increase the number of court sitting days much further and so to reduce these shameful court backlogs?

The noble Lord raises a very important point, and once again I agree with his fundamental premise. The difficulty is that any court in the Crown Court is a complex system. It is not just a room or just a judge; it is also things such as numbers of court staff, advocates and prison cells available in that court system. Currently we are funding 111,250 sitting days, as I said, and the Lady Chief Justice has said the maximum available is 113,000. But that is just rooms and judges, not all the rest of the infrastructure. That is why we are looking at Sir Brian Leveson’s reforms and will respond in due course.

My Lords, I accept the pretty appalling inheritance with which the Government have been dealing over the past year or so. Nevertheless, as we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Austin, some—perhaps a small number—of these cases are related to terrorism offences. Considering the small number of those offences, and the way in which lengthy delays in terrorism-related cases could affect public confidence in the court system, is there some way that such cases could be expedited?

I thank my noble friend for that, and I can understand why that seems like an obvious solution. But the separation of powers between the Government and the courts is one of the fundamental protections of any citizen. Therefore, putting pressure on judges to alter a judicial decision would be wrong and is something that this Government will not do. What I can say is that all judges—I know this because I was one—do not just take cases in the order in which they come into the system; they prioritise certain categories. For example, those with vulnerable victims and witnesses, particularly children, will always jump the queue. Where the Lady Chief Justice and her judges put these particular cases is a matter for them, and I am sure that she will look at them with the attention they deserve.

I of course accept what the Minister says, but there can be a dialogue with the Government. We saw that last year in Southport, where the Attorney-General and the Prime Minister worked with the prosecution system to ensure that a message was getting through that crimes would have quick consequences to deter further action. Is there not a case for doing this with politically motivated crimes, such as Palestine Action and other politically motivated areas, where the lack of deterrence is increasing the prospect of the ringleaders being able to recruit more people into the net?

The noble Lord raises an interesting point. I can understand why it could be seen that the responses to the riots had been prioritised, but there are many reasons why those prosecutions took place very quickly. The first is that many of the cases were straightforward and could be dealt with in a magistrates’ court; the second is that, in relation to many of them, the evidence was very strong and people pleaded guilty; and the third is that the decisions involved were made by the police, the Crown Prosecution Service and the independent judiciary. The Government made sure that they had the resources if they needed them, but no pressure was put on them to decide how to do it.

Recent data from the Criminal Bar Association shows substantial regional variations in trial delays. What specific steps are being taken to reduce these geographic disparities in trial delays?

I thank the noble Lord for that question. It is an interesting point. For example, the delays are much worse in central London than they are in Wales. There can be all kinds of reasons for that. I have already said that a trial, as the noble Lord knows, is a complicated factor. There are difficulties because you cannot just, for example, ship cases out to somewhere else; we cannot send a whole lot of London’s cases out to Cardiff because of the effect on victims, witnesses and defendants and the movement around of people within the prison estate. But it is important to look to see where lessons can be learned from other parts of the country and to see whether they are doing things that could be imported to other parts of the country so that we can do better there.

My Lords, the Minister has said a couple of times that the response to the Leveson recommendations will be delivered in due course. Can she possibly tell us what “in due course” looks like, because it has been quite a long time already?

That is another good question, as one would expect. The right reverend Prelate would not expect me to give a precise date, and I cannot. I am sure that noble Lords will understand that the recommendations made by Sir Brian Leveson, to whom we are extremely grateful, are robust and far reaching. They will have a potentially radical effect on our justice system as we know it, and it is right that the Government take time to consider them and make sure that there are no unexpected effects on other parts of the system—for example, on the prison estate. If more people are sent to prison, can the prison estate cope with it? For that reason, impact assessments are being undertaken, and we will respond as soon as we are sure that what we are recommending will actually work.