The Jury Alliance launches national day of action

The Jury Alliance is a campaign demonstrating the wide-spread public opposition to the government’s plan to restrict the right to trial by jury in England and Wales.

Continuing the campaign, a national day of action took place on Monday 18 May outside half the crown courts in England and Wales. Events happened at 40 Crown Courts, from Carlislie to Truro, Caernarfon to Norwich, across both nations.

Groups of local people held public-information sessions close to court buildings and also in the city centres later in the day. They spoke to the public about the vital role the jury has in the criminal justice system and local crime control.

They also made plain the government’s deliberate misinformation that decimating juries will somehow fix the backlog. The Institute for Government and Bar Council have said that this drastic step will only reduce the backlog by 2%, reducing a two year wait by just one week.

There is growing public and professional opposition to the Courts and Tribunal Bill, currently at Report stage. The Bill, which did not feature in the Labour manifesto, is being rushed through parliament with one MP commenting that the Bill would have:

about the same time the House once spent scrutinising the Salmon Act 1986, which introduced the offence of handling salmon in suspicious circumstances.

Widespread opposition to jury changes

Many legal professionals have spoken out against the changes and justice secretary David Lammy’s claims citing that the real fix for the backlog was an increase to the number of courts, judicial sitting days and reform to the Legal Aid system and Prisoner Transport service.

Flora Page KC resigned from the regulator, the Legal Services Board, so she could openly oppose the Courts and Tribunals Bill. Page, who represented sub-postmasters in the Post Office Enquiry, said:

If this were genuinely about the backlog, there would be a sunset clause – a commitment to reinstate these rights once the backlog reaches an acceptable level. There is no such clause.

Recent figures are evidence that Lammy’s action to lift the cap on sitting days in February this year has already:

significantly reduced the backlog in key regions of England and Wales.

If passed, the Courts and Tribunals Bill for the first time removes a defendant’s right to elect a Crown Court trial (with a jury) in either-way cases.

Cases where the likely sentence is three years or less would be heard by a single judge replacing the jury (12 randomly selected members of the public) for tens of thousands of cases each year.

It was Lammy’s own report that found that people of colour receive a fairer trial with a jury than in front of magistrates.

Dr Clive Dolphin, a spokesperson from The Jury Alliance, said:

In 2023 the Ministry of Justice looked at what was quintessentially British and what the British public valued most. The top two were the NHS and trial by jury.

Everyone will be impacted by the bill, and for those already marginalised in the criminal justice system it’s a disaster. People trust juries. We must show the strength of public feeling against it, it’s the best means we have of stopping it.

Geoffrey Cox KC, a practising criminal barrister of 44 years, told the House of Commons during the bill’s second reading debate:

Jury trial is the most powerful instrument and engine of social justice that this country has ever invented. It is a safeguard against oppression. It is a built-in defence against establishment and administrative power.

Featured image via The Jury Alliance