Concerns are growing among criminal practitioners that the 'charging project' is damaging their health, scuppering the legal aid fund, and seeing offenders roam the streets owing to lack of staff.

Both prosecution and defence lawyers spoke out as it emerged that Martin Howard, chief Crown prosecutor for Leicester, has suspended the allocation of a duty prosecutor at a local police station until the autumn. The charging scheme has seen responsibility for charging successfully transferred from the police to crown prosecutors, but Mr Howard said the move, combined with other recent changes in the criminal justice system, had put 'more stresses and strains' on his prosecutors. 'We are not unique in this - every CPS [Crown Prosecution Service] area is experiencing the same thing,' Mr Howard said.


Prosecutors' union, the First Division Association (FDA), has now told its members to demand what steps their own bosses are taking. Convenor Kris Venkatasami said CPS management was becoming 'increasingly unsympathetic' towards the plight of exhausted lawyers who were doing back-to-back shifts in the police stations and courts. He has written to prosecutors requesting court and police station rotas so that the FDA can determine the extent of the problem.


Rodney Warren, director of the Criminal Law Solicitors Association, said CPS staff shortages had left defence solicitors sitting in the police station for hours with their clients, waiting for a charging decision - which was likely to increase the burden on the legal aid fund. 'The police can also suffer from the temptation to bail defendants until they can get a decision made, rather than sit and wait,' he warned.


A CPS spokesman said a small number of CPS areas had withdrawn coverage from some of their charging centres owing to problems with providing services over the summer holidays. He added: 'We are now working with areas to review their schemes and resources to ensure that a high level of professional service and coverage is maintained and that sites are not closed wherever possible.'