Restriction of Jury Trials

Debate between Baroness Levitt and Lord Young of Acton

Wednesday 10th December 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

The noble Lord makes an important point. There are delays between report of an offence and charge. The reasons for those can be very complicated. I used to work for the Crown Prosecution Service and I know how difficult it can be. An awful lot of investigation has to go on. Quite often, such investigations are looking at events that took place an awfully long time ago. It is probably fair to say that everybody thinks that we could and should do better. The Home Office deals with matters in relation to the police, but I will ensure that I write to the noble Lord and answer his question, which is a perfectly proper one.

[Lord Young of Acton (Con)]

Will the Minister condemn the remarks of one of her colleagues in the other place, who smeared defenders of the right to trial by jury as men in suits defending a Magna Carta myth? In fact, the right to trial by jury dates to before Magna Carta, to Henry II, who, I point out, for the benefit of the Justice Secretary, came after Henry I and not before.

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

Oh dear. I feel that I did not even respond to the point of the noble Lord, Lord Gove, about me explaining it better than the Deputy Prime Minister. I am certainly not going to agree with that, and I am not going to be giving the Deputy Prime Minister any history lessons either.

This Government are completely committed to jury trial. There is absolutely no question of our doing away with jury trials. All we are doing is moving some cases down so that they will be dealt with in the magistrates’ court in order to free up space. We are not the only Government to have done this. The Criminal Justice Act 1988 reclassified three groups of offences—common assault, taking vehicles without consent and criminal damage—that had previously been triable either way as summary only. Does anybody want to take a history lesson on which Government were in power?

Criminal Court Reform

Debate between Baroness Levitt and Lord Young of Acton

Tuesday 2nd December 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

I can reassure my noble friend that the consultation has been extensive. That does not necessarily mean that they agree with us or that all of them agree with us, although I observe—I say this as a practising criminal barrister myself—that it is a profession known for its caution; it is not always, shall we say, ready to adopt new ideas in particular ways. I am confident that once this system has had an opportunity to bed in, everyone will see the advantages.

[Lord Young of Acton (Con)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as the director of the Free Speech Union. If the Government are serious about wanting to reduce delays and backlogs in the Crown Courts, they should stop creating so many new criminal offences. In the Crime and Policing Bill alone, there are 65 new criminal offences. At the Free Speech Union, we have analysed Ministry of Justice data from 2017 to 2025, comparing the acquittal rates for those charged with speech crimes in jury trials with those for non-jury trials. The results are quite startling. For all offences, Crown Courts have acquitted 21.6% of defendants in the last eight years, compared with just 11.4% in magistrates’ courts. However, for speech-related offences, the acquittal rate in jury trials rises to 27.6%, compared with 15.9% in the magistrates’ courts. In the last three years, juries have been even more likely to find defendants not guilty of speech crimes—32.1%, compared with 14.1%. To protect free speech, will the Minister urge the Justice Secretary to retain the right to trial by jury for those accused of speech offences?

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord and pay tribute to his work in relation to freedom of speech, which is important to all of us. However, as I said in answer to the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, we are not having carve-outs for particular kinds of offences or defendants. It would create a raft of unfairness and make the system so complicated that it would not be possible to run it.

Universities: Free Speech

Debate between Baroness Levitt and Lord Young of Acton

Tuesday 1st April 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

My Lords—

[Lord Young of Acton (Con)]

My Lords—

[Captain of the Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms and Chief Whip (Lord Kennedy of Southwark) (Lab Co-op)]

We will hear from my noble friend Lady Levitt next and then from the noble Lord, Lord Young, after that.