Rachel Reeves in February 2023 with Finchley and Golders Green parliamentary candidate Sarah Sackman, now a justice minister (PA Images / Alamy Stock Photo)
3 min read
Justice minister Sarah Sackman has said that “nothing short of bold reform will do” while discussing the government-commissioned review that will look at whether there should be new limits on the right to a jury trial.
Speaking at the Jewish Labour Movement conference on Sunday, Sackman said: “Jury trials will always be there for the most serious offences.
“But we have to countenance the notion that certain offences will come out of the crown court altogether and that some offences might be more appropriate for not having a jury trial but for having a judge-led trial.”
She added: “I don’t think we can allow an understandable sentimental attachment to a certain way of doing things if that certain way of doing things simply isn’t delivering for anyone.”
Currently, those accused of “either-way” offences – such as theft, burglary and drug offences – can choose to be tried in either the magistrates’ or crown court. It is said that defence barristers often advise their clients to opt for the crown court because it offers a higher chance of acquittal. Crown courts have juries, while magistrate courts do not.
Amid significant crown court backlogs, the Labour government has asked Sir Brian Leveson to carry out an independent review of criminal courts. It will look at the possible introduction of an intermediate court, and at the reclassification of offences from “either-way” to “summary-only” which can only be tried in the magistrates’ court.
Former justice secretary Jack Straw, who supported the same reform while serving in the New Labour government, backs the change. He said on the Where Politics Meets Justice podcast that there would be a “terrible fuss” over it but that it would soon die down.
“Rationally, there is no case whatsoever for giving the defendant a right to decide the forum for their [trial], to play the system,” Straw told the podcast.
Sackman was elected as the Labour MP for Finchley and Golders Green at the last general election, before which she worked as a barrister.
She joined the stage at the JLM one-day conference on Sunday for an ‘in-conversation’ event with Ken Macdonald KC, who was director of public prosecutions before being succeeded by Keir Starmer.
Macdonald said: “There will be pushback from people attached to jury trial and may see that [reform] as a watering down of a fundamental right British people have – to take almost all cases to a jury, apart from the most trivial, if that’s what they want to do.”
On the idea that ‘justice delayed is justice denied’, Sackman told the conference: “I don’t want anyone to imagine that anything less than bold reform is going to fix this.
“That’s why we’ve asked Sir Brian Leveson to look at a whole range of options which can include and is likely to include the reclassification of some offences, the proposal – the potential idea – of an intermediate court.
“We’ve got to look at everything because at the moment we’re simply not delivering for anyone.”
In December the government said the backlog of cases waiting to be heard by crown courts had surpassed 73,000.
Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood last year extended the sentencing powers of magistrates, allowing them to issue custodial sentences for up to 12 months for a single offence, up from six months.
The move was criticised by the Criminal Bar Association, which said the “knee-jerk” policy decision “simply won’t address” the problem of court delays, while chair Mary Prior KC said it would “make things worse” by increasing pressure on prisons.
PoliticsHome Newsletters
PoliticsHome provides the most comprehensive coverage of UK politics anywhere on the web, offering high quality original reporting and analysis: Subscribe
+ There are no comments
Add yours