Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, whether he plans to amend the right of offenders sentenced to an Indefinite Hospital Order to apply for a review every 12 months; and whether he has made an assessment of the impact of those reviews on (a) victims and (b) families.
Answered by Gareth Bacon - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
Hospital Orders and the provisions around them are set out in the Mental Health Act 1983 and ensure regular access for patients to a review of their detention by an independent court which will determine whether the criteria for detention continue to be met.
This Government is committed to ensuring that victims’ voices are heard. We are working with the judiciary to introduce an entitlement in the Victims’ Code for Victim Personal Statements in the Mental Health Tribunal, where an offender’s detention is being reviewed. This will give victims the opportunity to explain the impact of the crime on them, and we continue to assess the provision of support for victims engaging with criminal justice processes like the Mental Health Tribunal.
Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if his Department will make an assessment of the adequacy of rates of processing probate applications by HM Courts and Tribunals Service.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The probate service received record levels of applications during 2022 and this has continued to grow with higher levels of receipts during January to June 2023 compared to the same period in 2022. Whilst HMCTS has increased resources to meet the higher demand the training and upskilling of those new and existing staff has led to applications taking longer in the short term.
HMCTS are focused on increasing outputs to reduce overall timeliness on all types of applications and the average mean length of time taken for a grant of probate, following receipt of the documents required, is 13 weeks during April to June 2023.
Average waiting times for probate grants are routinely published on gov.uk via Family Court Statistics Quarterly and currently cover the period up to June 2023.
Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what recent progress his Department has made on its meeting the commitments made in the Government’s full response to the Criminal Legal Aid Independent Review and consultation on policy proposals, published in December 2022.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
In November 2022 we published our full response to the Criminal Legal Aid Independent Review (CLAIR), setting out various proposals to ensure the long-term sustainability of the criminal legal aid sector.
This followed the interim response to the CLAIR which introduced a 15% uplift across most fee schemes in line with the recommendations made in the Review. This funding began to come into effect from the end of September 2022, and we subsequently agreed to extend it to the majority of cases already progressing in the Crown Court. Following these reforms, an increase in expenditure of up to £141 million a year will take expected annual criminal legal aid spend to £1.2 billion.
We have established the Criminal Legal Aid Advisory Board (CLAAB) in October 2022, now chaired by former judge Deborah Taylor, to bring together criminal justice system partners to take a wider view and encourage a more joined-up approach to criminal legal aid within the criminal justice system. We are continuing to work with the CLAAB on our proposals, including long term reform of the Litigators’ Graduated Fee Scheme and Advocates’ Graduated Fee Scheme, to reform criminal legal aid fees.
In addition to the 15% uplift that was applied to both the magistrates’ court and police station fee schemes from 30 September 2022, we will be investing a further £16m into the police station fee scheme and £5.1m towards youth court fees which currently sits under the magistrates’ court fee scheme. In total, this will be an additional £21.1m going to solicitors over the next financial year (2024/25). We will be consulting further on how this money will be distributed within the fee schemes.
Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will make an estimate of the number of criminal duty solicitors working in Erith and Thamesmead constituency.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The Legal Aid Agency (LAA) is responsible for commissioning duty solicitor services and the day-to-day administration of the court and police station duty schemes. This includes keeping membership records, allocating slots and producing and maintaining duty solicitor rotas. The LAA monitors membership across individual duty schemes. Information about duty solicitor volumes broken down by individual scheme is published as part of the LAA’s quarterly statistics.
Legal Aid services are not procured at constituency level, however, the duty schemes falling with the Erith and Thamesmead constituency include the Bexley and Greenwich/Woolwich schemes.
At a national level, the LAA monitors capacity across criminal legal aid contracts on an ongoing basis and, where demand is greater than the available supply, takes action to secure additional provision to ensure the continuity of legal aid-funded services.
The LAA is satisfied that there continues to be sufficient duty solicitor coverage on the duty schemes operating in Erith and Thamesmead. Provision under the duty schemes is demand led and so there may be variations in numbers across each local rota or other fluctuations in numbers depending on prevailing market conditions, and other internal factors such as firms merging or other consolidation activity.
Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps his Department is taking to ensure the robustness of (a) technical and (b) software systems used by HM Court and Tribunal Service to process probate applications.
Answered by Mike Freer - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Ministry of Justice)
The Probate Service is supported by robust technology and software, which is maintained and improved by a dedicated team of software developers.
We seek regular feedback from users of the service, which influences the priorities of the software development team. All our technical systems meet Government standards, including alignment with architectural and cyber security principles.
HMCTS is required to complete an annual Data Protection Impact Assessment, which is a process to help identify and minimize the data protection risks of the service.
Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of extending the proposed 15 per cent increase in legal aid fees to the approximately 58,000 cases that are currently backlogged in the Crown courts.
Answered by Sarah Dines
We are introducing a 15% uplift across most fee schemes in line with the recommendations made in the Criminal Legal Aid Independent Review. This, alongside longer-term reforms, will increase spend by £135m a year – alongside our investment in court recovery this would take expected criminal legal aid spend to £1.2 billion per year. We have given careful consideration to the idea of increasing fees on current cases but there are a number of reasons why our current approach is the fastest process possible.
The median figure after expenses for specialist criminal barristers in the first three years is around £19,000 with the figure increasing significantly after the first year. Thus, the median income after expenses for barristers with 2 years of practice is around £32,000. Between 3 to 7 years of practice, their median income after expenses is around £50,000. The figures above are based on the evidence published by Independent Review into Criminal Legal Aid. It should be noted that this, in its turn, was based on a common dataset shared by the MoJ and Bar Council, constructed following a data share agreement between the MoJ (Legal Aid Agency), Bar Council and Crown Prosecution Service. It has not been possible to compare our estimates on barristers’ annual income after expenses with the minimum wage per hour as we do not hold information on the number of weeks and hours per week that barristers work.
The 15% pay increase would mean a typical criminal barrister earning around £7,000 extra per year. We are moving as quickly as possible to introduce fee rises by the end of September. Solicitors and barristers will start to receive increased fees this year and our modelling suggests that over two thirds of the additional funding will have entered the system within the first year.
Criminal barristers play a crucial role in upholding the rule of law and are a fundamental part of our criminal justice system. Our plans to increase legal aid fees will put criminal legal aid on a sustainable footing and ensure there is a sustainable supply of practitioners.
The Government is committed to supporting recovery across the court system. Over the next three financial years, we are investing an extra £477 million for the Criminal Justice System to help improve waiting times for victims of crime and reduce the Crown Court backlog to an estimated 53,000 cases by March 2025.
The outstanding caseload in the Crown Court has reduced from around 60,600 cases in June 2021 to around 58,300 cases at the end of April 2022.
We have removed the limit of sitting days in the Crown Court for the second year in a row, extended 30 Nightingale courtrooms and raised the mandatory judicial retirement age from 70 to 75. We have also opened two new ‘super courtrooms’ in Manchester and Loughborough, allowing up to an extra 250 cases a year to be heard across England and Wales.
We are also expanding our plans for judicial recruitment to secure enough judicial capacity to sit at the required levels in 2022/2023 and beyond.
By the end of March 2023, we expect to get through 20% more Crown Court cases than we did pre-Covid (117,000 in 2022/23 compared to 97,000 in 2019/20).
Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps he plans to take to (a) improve the retention of criminal barristers and (b) reduce court backlogs.
Answered by Sarah Dines
We are introducing a 15% uplift across most fee schemes in line with the recommendations made in the Criminal Legal Aid Independent Review. This, alongside longer-term reforms, will increase spend by £135m a year – alongside our investment in court recovery this would take expected criminal legal aid spend to £1.2 billion per year. We have given careful consideration to the idea of increasing fees on current cases but there are a number of reasons why our current approach is the fastest process possible.
The median figure after expenses for specialist criminal barristers in the first three years is around £19,000 with the figure increasing significantly after the first year. Thus, the median income after expenses for barristers with 2 years of practice is around £32,000. Between 3 to 7 years of practice, their median income after expenses is around £50,000. The figures above are based on the evidence published by Independent Review into Criminal Legal Aid. It should be noted that this, in its turn, was based on a common dataset shared by the MoJ and Bar Council, constructed following a data share agreement between the MoJ (Legal Aid Agency), Bar Council and Crown Prosecution Service. It has not been possible to compare our estimates on barristers’ annual income after expenses with the minimum wage per hour as we do not hold information on the number of weeks and hours per week that barristers work.
The 15% pay increase would mean a typical criminal barrister earning around £7,000 extra per year. We are moving as quickly as possible to introduce fee rises by the end of September. Solicitors and barristers will start to receive increased fees this year and our modelling suggests that over two thirds of the additional funding will have entered the system within the first year.
Criminal barristers play a crucial role in upholding the rule of law and are a fundamental part of our criminal justice system. Our plans to increase legal aid fees will put criminal legal aid on a sustainable footing and ensure there is a sustainable supply of practitioners.
The Government is committed to supporting recovery across the court system. Over the next three financial years, we are investing an extra £477 million for the Criminal Justice System to help improve waiting times for victims of crime and reduce the Crown Court backlog to an estimated 53,000 cases by March 2025.
The outstanding caseload in the Crown Court has reduced from around 60,600 cases in June 2021 to around 58,300 cases at the end of April 2022.
We have removed the limit of sitting days in the Crown Court for the second year in a row, extended 30 Nightingale courtrooms and raised the mandatory judicial retirement age from 70 to 75. We have also opened two new ‘super courtrooms’ in Manchester and Loughborough, allowing up to an extra 250 cases a year to be heard across England and Wales.
We are also expanding our plans for judicial recruitment to secure enough judicial capacity to sit at the required levels in 2022/2023 and beyond.
By the end of March 2023, we expect to get through 20% more Crown Court cases than we did pre-Covid (117,000 in 2022/23 compared to 97,000 in 2019/20).
Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the adequacy of the proposed 15 per cent increase in legal aid fees in the context of how remuneration from those fees for junior barristers compares with minimum wage.
Answered by Sarah Dines
We are introducing a 15% uplift across most fee schemes in line with the recommendations made in the Criminal Legal Aid Independent Review. This, alongside longer-term reforms, will increase spend by £135m a year – alongside our investment in court recovery this would take expected criminal legal aid spend to £1.2 billion per year. We have given careful consideration to the idea of increasing fees on current cases but there are a number of reasons why our current approach is the fastest process possible.
The median figure after expenses for specialist criminal barristers in the first three years is around £19,000 with the figure increasing significantly after the first year. Thus, the median income after expenses for barristers with 2 years of practice is around £32,000. Between 3 to 7 years of practice, their median income after expenses is around £50,000. The figures above are based on the evidence published by Independent Review into Criminal Legal Aid. It should be noted that this, in its turn, was based on a common dataset shared by the MoJ and Bar Council, constructed following a data share agreement between the MoJ (Legal Aid Agency), Bar Council and Crown Prosecution Service. It has not been possible to compare our estimates on barristers’ annual income after expenses with the minimum wage per hour as we do not hold information on the number of weeks and hours per week that barristers work.
The 15% pay increase would mean a typical criminal barrister earning around £7,000 extra per year. We are moving as quickly as possible to introduce fee rises by the end of September. Solicitors and barristers will start to receive increased fees this year and our modelling suggests that over two thirds of the additional funding will have entered the system within the first year.
Criminal barristers play a crucial role in upholding the rule of law and are a fundamental part of our criminal justice system. Our plans to increase legal aid fees will put criminal legal aid on a sustainable footing and ensure there is a sustainable supply of practitioners.
The Government is committed to supporting recovery across the court system. Over the next three financial years, we are investing an extra £477 million for the Criminal Justice System to help improve waiting times for victims of crime and reduce the Crown Court backlog to an estimated 53,000 cases by March 2025.
The outstanding caseload in the Crown Court has reduced from around 60,600 cases in June 2021 to around 58,300 cases at the end of April 2022.
We have removed the limit of sitting days in the Crown Court for the second year in a row, extended 30 Nightingale courtrooms and raised the mandatory judicial retirement age from 70 to 75. We have also opened two new ‘super courtrooms’ in Manchester and Loughborough, allowing up to an extra 250 cases a year to be heard across England and Wales.
We are also expanding our plans for judicial recruitment to secure enough judicial capacity to sit at the required levels in 2022/2023 and beyond.
By the end of March 2023, we expect to get through 20% more Crown Court cases than we did pre-Covid (117,000 in 2022/23 compared to 97,000 in 2019/20).
Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps his Department is taking to ensure justice sector staff are protected from abuse and assaults at work.
Answered by James Cartlidge - Minister of State (Ministry of Defence)
The Assaults on Emergency Workers (Offences) Act 2018 doubled the maximum penalty for those who assault emergency workers, including prison officers and custody officers, from 6 to 12 months’ imprisonment for common assault or battery, with higher maximum penalties for serious offences.
Through the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill, we are again doubling the maximum penalty for the assault of an emergency worker, from 12 months’ to two years’ imprisonment.
The bill will also create a new statutory aggravating factor for offences committed against those staff providing a public service, performing a public duty or providing a service to the public.
Asked by: Abena Oppong-Asare (Labour - Erith and Thamesmead)
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many people are serving (a) prison sentences and (b) Imprisonment for Public Protection (IPP) sentences in prisons in Erith and Thamesmead constituency; how many of those people serving IPP sentences are (i) post-tariff, (ii) have been recalled to custody and (iii) have been recalled to custody for non-compliance as opposed to further offending.
Answered by Alex Chalk - Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice
For prisons in Erith and Thamesmead constituency (HM Prisons Isis, Belmarsh and Thameside), as at 31 March 2021:
(a) 1,347 people were serving prison sentences;
(b) 28 of these were serving Imprisonment for Public Protection (IPP) sentences, of which:
(i) 28 were post-tariff;
(ii) 22 of which had been recalled; and
(iii) 8 of the recalled prisoners were recalled solely for reasons other than further offending.
There is often more than one reason for recalling an offender, specifically in relation to recalls taking place on the basis of non-compliance. For the purpose of this answer, all reasons for recall other than further offending have been amalgamated to provide the answer for (b)(iii). The figures have been drawn from administrative IT systems which, as with any large scale recording system, are subject to possible errors with data entry and processing.
The power to recall is a vital public protection measure. Offenders on licence in the community will be recalled to custody where they breach their licence conditions in such a way as to indicate that their risk has increased to the level where it may no longer be managed effectively in the community.
Our primary responsibility is to protect the public; however, HMPPS remains committed to safely reducing the number of prisoners serving IPP sentences in custody.