The police are abusing bail rules, the chairman of the Law Society’s criminal law committee has alleged. Richard Atkinson has called for evidence from solicitors of what he believes to be a worsening phenomenon.

He said: ‘Practitioners have very real concerns that huge numbers of people are being kept on bail for an inordinate amount of time without there appearing to be any basis for this.’

Chancery Lane is asking criminal practitioners to gather evidence of cases where clients suspected of committing offences have been placed on pre-charge bail for longer than six months.

Solicitors are asked to provide clients’ custody record numbers, with their consent, which will be given to the Home Office to inform its review of pre-charge bail.

The review follows emergency legislation, the Police (Detention and Bail) Act 2011, which was passed in July as a result of the Divisional Court’s decision in the case of Paul Hookway.

That judgment said the police could not bail someone beyond the maximum 96-hour period that they are allowed to hold someone in custody without charge.

The 2011 act was passed to make clear that the previously accepted interpretation of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 - that the detention time limit is suspended when a suspect is released on pre-charge bail - is correct.

During the passage of the act, the Law Society wrote to the home secretary Theresa May raising concerns about the overuse of police bail.

Atkinson said: ‘It is felt that the police sometimes use their power of arrest and pre-charge bail when it is unnecessary, and the fact that they can re-bail people means they do not carry out their investigations expeditiously.

‘As police have the power to impose bail conditions, they can restrict the liberty of people who have not been charged with any offence for unnecessary and protracted periods of time.’

A spokeswoman for the Association of Chief Police Officers said forensic processes and technology developed over the last 25 years have made the investigation process more complex, and officers needed time to deal with matters ‘appropriately and thoroughly’.

Solicitors should email information to the Society’s criminal law policy advisor Janet Arkinstall.