Magistrates told to stop jailing offenders to ease prisons crisis

Magistrates have been told to stop jailing convicted criminals for several weeks in the latest effort to ease pressure on Britain’s overcrowded prisons.
One of the country’s senior judges has issued a “listing direction” to the managers of magistrates’ courts in England and Wales saying that offenders who are on bail and likely to be jailed should have their sentencing hearings postponed until at least September 10.
The order could affect some who have pleaded guilty to offences during the recent spate of rioting as well as others facing sentences for crimes including assaults.
Magistrates have voiced scepticism over the order, describing it as little more than a “sticking plaster” for a criminal justice system that is said to be in crisis.
The September date marks the start of a government move to free about 2,000 prison places as part of an early release scheme.
The order to magistrates from Lord Justice Green, who sits on the Court of Appeal and is also the deputy senior presiding judge, is likely to affect hundreds if not thousands of offenders.
Official figures showed that magistrates’ courts handled more than 1.33 million cases last year, with criminal offences ranging from minor assaults to theft and handling stolen goods.
Magistrates can hand down maximum jail sentences of six months for a single offence and up to 12 months for multiple offences.
In his direction to magistrate court managers, Green said that the order was set against the backdrop of the “current capacity challenges in the prisons”.
The bottleneck in the court system — exacerbated by the arrest of more than 1,000 people after far-right violence that began last month — has slowed sentencing and resulted in a situation where less serious offences are being overlooked because of capacity constraints.
Government figures this week showed that fewer than 1,300 places were available in prisons in England and Wales. The crisis affecting the country’s creaking prison network has been encapsulated by scandal-hit HMP Wandsworth in southwest London, which is thought to be close to its maximum capacity of 1,665 inmates.
But from September 10, the government will implement its emergency early release scheme, which is forecast to free 2,000 places immediately and another 1,700 by October 22.
• Q&A: Why emergency measures have been triggered for prison overcrowding
According to ministers, in the longer term, the scheme will free up to 5,500 prison places.
The core of the scheme involves moving the standard release date of most prisoners from 50 per cent of their sentence served to 40 per cent. The scheme will not include prisoners serving sentences for violent offences of four years or more, as well as sex and domestic violence offences.
Green has now told magistrates that as the courts “are responsible for the proper administration of justice … [it] is therefore appropriate that the judiciary have regard to the wider functioning of the criminal justice system”.
As a result, he said that “where it is assessed that a custodial sentence is a possible outcome, consideration should be given to rescheduling the hearing for the shortest possible period of time, but not earlier than 10th September 2024”.
Green emphasised that “every case must be considered individually, and decisions must be made upon the basis of the interests of justice” and that the process “needs to be a carefully conducted exercise”.
The senior judiciary did not comment further on Green’s order.
• Swift justice is essential for victims and the public
But Tom Franklin, the chief executive of the Magistrates’ Association, said that “every delay in magistrates’ work adversely affects the timely delivery of justice and impacts victims, witnesses and defendants”.
He said Green’s move “seems to be the latest sticking plaster to try to get through until the big release of prisoners on 10 September but just highlights the crisis that the justice system is in”.
The association has called for increased investment in “the whole criminal justice system” as well as what Franklin described as “a long-term joined-up plan, where all parts of the justice system — including police, courts, probation and prisons — are considered together. We also need a grown-up discussion about the purpose of prison, and indeed other types of sentences such as community sentences.”
Robert Buckland, the former Conservative justice secretary, said that it was “very concerning that magistrates will have their hands tied even temporarily in sentencing and what they think should be done in the interests of justice”.
He called on Labour ministers to “pursue the prison-building programme that I initiated as justice secretary”.
A source close to the magistrates’ courts, who did not wish to be identified, told The Times that while the crisis was not the current government’s making, “allowing interference in the judicial process isn’t a particularly good thing”.
A Ministry of Justice spokesman said that the “new government inherited a prisons crisis, and this is yet another sign of the pressures our justice system is facing. The changes coming into force in September will bring it under control.“Independent judges decide when to schedule court hearings and do so in the interests of justice, including to ensure the effective operation of the criminal justice system.”
Green’s order to magistrates came ten months after the senior presiding judge issued a similar temporary order to the crown courts.
Last October The Times revealed that Lord Justice Edis told judges in the crown courts, which try the most serious crimes in England and Wales, to delay sentencing convicted offenders who were on bail at the time.
The senior judiciary never officially acknowledged that the order had been made — although The Times was given a leaked copy — and it is understood that it was lifted after several weeks.