Shadow Justice Secretary Robert Jenrick was on the morning media round today to talk about the growing row over the latest Sentencing Council guidelines. The new rules require pre-sentence reports for ethnic, cultural, and faith ‘minorities’ – a move that some say reduces their chances of being sent to jail. Justice Secretary Mahmood claimed she knew nothing about it, despite having a representative, Claire Fielder at the meeting that signed it off…
Over on the Today Programme, presenter Emma Barnett went on the attack, saying that this guidance was actually approved in February last year under the Tory government. Jenrick wasn’t having it. He swiftly fact-checked Barnett, pointing out that what she was referring to was a draft report, which said judges “may” consider pre-sentence reports – not require them, as this latest guidance does. He also reminded her that then-Justice Secretary Alex Chalk had called the guidance “ridiculous”…
Barnett went on to take a swipe at Jenrick for suggesting Mahmood was unaware of the new rules – repeatedly interrupting with “that’s just your perspective”, despite Mahmood admitting she didn’t know about it. Then came a readout from a listener claiming that Jenrick’s warning about discrimination against “straight white men” was “objectively false.” Labour will need to get a handle on this one…
Guido hears there is disquiet in Whitehall over the fact that the backlog in the courts is deemed irrecoverable in the Ministry of Justice. It will continue to rise. There is also no set date forecast in the department for the court backlog to begin falling…
The latest backlog figure sits at 73,105 – almost double the 38,000 from before Covid. The MoJ boasts that Shabana Mahmood has funded an extra 2,500 sitting days for this year – her permanent secretary Antonia Romeo predicts the backlog will be even higher by this time in 2026 without “changes to the system.” Seven courtrooms are sitting unused at the Old Bailey today – a third of its total. That tops the new online leaderboard – a total of 67 courtrooms across the country are empty today. No wonder people feel crime is rife with the courts in total paralysis…
The UK’s courts are racking up record backlogs as the after-effects of the pandemic and the 2022 barristers’ strike are blamed for an ongoing productivity crisis in the justice system- 73,000 trials were unheard at the end of September. Any layman would expect that courts are constantly full and overloaded – not so…
The group behind the Crush Crime campaign and the new Looking for Growth Initiative of innovation-oriented entrepreneurs and activists has organised a new public court leaderboard to make otherwise unavailable information on court sitting rates public. The tracker is updated every day…
Lawrence Newport points out that “on any given working day 10-30% of our Crown Courts are simply shut – instead of clearing the backlog of 73,000+ cases that are languishing in our court system.” Today the Old Bailey has a whopping eight courtrooms unused – a third of its total. Court sitting days have been capped at a lower number by the government than last year at 106,500. The number agreed by the Tory government was increased by Mahmood by only 500 – which is “at least 5,500 fewer than the capacity of the system” according to the Lady Chief Justice. Now the public can see that spare capacity borne out every day…
Last week Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood has announced plans to release thousands of prisoners early by reducing the minimum sentence term spent in prison from 50% to 40%. A Tory plan that Guido revealed first back in May…
The public aren’t happy with it. New YouGov research finds that a whopping 71% oppose the policy. Only one in six (17%) are in support. It sits at the bottom of the list of preferred solutions to the overcrowding crisis…
This comes as the ONS drops crime statistics which show a 40% increase in theft, shoplifting at a two-decade high, and robbery up 8%. Most popular solutions include deporting foreign criminals and building more prisons. A far cry from the current policy – releasing convicts en masse into the streets…
Speaking to Sky News off the back of Rachel Reeves’ Air Passenger Duty hike, Ryanair chief executive Michael O’Leary said:
“Labour is dependent on those Red Wall seats, and yet every move she makes poisons economic growth and damages the UK’s recovery… it’s the Chancellor who stumbles from policy misstep to policy misstep… I think her policy decisions are incredibly stupid.”
