Criminal law practitioner groups have united to declare war on the government’s plans to curb jury trials at a meeting in which it emerged that a Labour MP vociferously opposed to the reforms is contemplating meeting justice secretary David Lammy halfway by suggesting a pilot.
Representatives for the London Criminal Courts Solicitors’ Association, Criminal Law Solicitors’ Association and Criminal Bar Association confirmed their opposition to Lammy's controversial plan to cut the Crown court backlog at a meeting in London last night.
LCCSA president Jason Lartey told the meeting that Lammy will reportedly be addressing parliament next Tuesday.
Lartey said a meeting took place yesterday at the Law Society with Labour MP Karl Turner, a former shadow justice minister. Solicitors heard that Turner, who has criticised the government’s ‘utterly ludicrous, unworkable policy’ in parliament, might put forward ‘as a last resort’ the idea of piloting a Crown court bench division. He would mention to Lammy whether the Law Society and Bar Council support or oppose a pilot.
However, University of Exeter’s Rebecca Helm, author of How Juries Work, told the meeting that any benefits from the pilot would be difficult to measure and pilots are expensive to set up.
Helm said juries play an important role democratically by interpreting legal terms in line with societal standards, and bring their collective expertise to make assessments of plausibility. With judge-alone trials, ‘there is a risk you end up holding people to standards that are not the standards of society but a particular person whose experience is detached from society more broadly’.
CLSA chair Katy Hanson highlighted the importance that justice is seen to be done and said defendants will feel they got a fair hearing if their case is heard by people from their community. Hanson fears the government will try to introduce the reforms quickly 'because they are aware of the feeling against it'.
Andrew Thomas KC, vice-chair of the Criminal Bar Association, said the CBA also opposes the removal of the automatic right of appeal from the magistrates’ court to the Crown court. Describing the right as an ‘important safeguard’, Thomas said more than 40% of appeals succeed ‘and they are not a great burden on the Crown court’.
Lammy’s proposals would see jury trials axed for crimes with sentences of less than three years. However, former CBA chair Chris Henley KC said: ‘The idea that receiving a three-year sentence is not a big deal and can be done differently, then why have juries at all? When you’re facing a sentence of imprisonment that can change your life, will end your job prospects, end your marriage, change your relationship with your children, that is something we need to carefully think about.'
During the highly-charged meeting, solicitors raised strike action, declining to take instructions, lobbying MPs and contacting Law Society Council members to voice concern about supporting any compromise. It was also suggested lawyers protest outside the Old Bailey, where there is a plaque commemorating jurors in Bushell's case. Jurors in the 1670 case refused to give a verdict against the defendants despite being locked up without food for two nights and were fined for their final 'not guilty' verdict.
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