Jury Trials

Alison Griffiths Excerpts

Wednesday 7th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst (Solihull West and Shirley) (Con)]

The right to trial by jury is not some procedural convenience capable of being abridged when the administrative weather turns foul; it is one of the great constitutional expressions of liberty under the law. It is overwhelmingly legitimate, because it places the citizen, and not the state, at the heart of criminal judgment. When the state proposes to narrow the circumstances in which it must persuade 12 of a defendant’s peers, it is not merely managing a backlog; it is fundamentally recalibrating the balance between the individual and the Crown.

There is no doubt that the criminal justice system is under acute strain. Victims and defendants wait too long. Justice is stretched thin. However, the issue before us is not whether reform is necessary, but whether this reform is justified, proportionate and supported by evidence.

[Alison Griffiths (Bognor Regis and Littlehampton) (Con)]

I hear everything my hon. Friend says. In his opening speech, my right hon. Friend the Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick) laid out a number of matters that could be acted on immediately to improve efficiency and ensure that we maintain the pillar of society that is our jury trials. Do you agree that we should be focusing immediately on that, rather than demolishing—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Ms Nusrat Ghani)]

Order. No “yous”—it is not me responding.

--- Later in debate ---

[Catherine Atkinson (Derby North) (Lab)]

I wanted to be a barrister from when I was a child. I did not know any lawyers, and I think I got most of my ideas about what lawyers did from TV shows, but jury trials is what I wanted to do. Some of my most memorable moments as a barrister were prosecuting and defending in front of juries, so I get the importance of jury trials, but I also saw courts falling down and delays getting longer and longer, and I have spent recent years hearing former colleagues talk about cases that are listed for three, four or five years’ time. We have heard that the Crown court backlog is sitting at 78,000 cases, and in every single case, justice is being put on hold—a family is left reeling from a burglary, a teenager is recovering from assault, or a survivor of sexual assault is waiting years for her day in court. It is not acceptable.

Of course I want increased funding, and with this Labour Government we are already beginning to see that; an additional £450 million per year has been earmarked for the court system over the spending review period to fund the increased number of court sitting days. However, Sir Brian Leveson made it abundantly clear that the current system cannot stop the backlog from growing. With more digital evidence being presented in court; more DNA, cell site, electronic and social media evidence; and the massive disclosure exercises, trials are more complex. Sir Brian Leveson found that jury trials are taking twice as long as they did in the year 2000.

I spent over a year of my time as a barrister working on a complicated insider trading fraud case. We spent huge amounts of time and resource working out how we would present that prosecution to a jury. This is not to say that juries are not capable, but in terms of suitability and proportionality, I need no persuasion that trial by jury is often not appropriate in fraud trials and similarly technical trials.

We must be absolutely clear that the proposal is not to scrap jury trials. The proposal is to amend the type of cases that are heard by juries. The types of cases being heard by jury have changed and evolved over time. It was the Conservatives who, through the Criminal Justice Act 1988 , made offences such as common assault and criminal damage summary only, and not subject to jury trial. We are rightly proud of our legal traditions, but it is untrue to suggest that the lack of jury trials is somehow unique to despotic regimes. Sweden, which is No. 1 in the World Justice Project’s global rankings, does not use jury trials at all. Norway, which is ranked No. 3, also does not—nor do Germany and the Netherlands. In France, Denmark and Canada, only the most serious cases are heard by juries.

I believe that jury trials are a fundamental part of system, and it is right that they remain so, but something has to change. Without really bold action, the backlog will continue to grow.

[Alison Griffiths]

I just wonder why the hon. Lady would not look to implement the recommendations from the shadow Secretary of State before seeking to restrict jury trials.

[Catherine Atkinson]

There are a huge number of additional measures that will be rolled out, and I look forward to continuing to engage with Justice Ministers on other measures that I believe will help. We have more coming after the next stage of the Leveson review.

We need bold action to ensure justice for victims across the country—and not years in the future. They need a criminal justice system that works. We all—the British people—need to have faith in our criminal justice system again.