Magistrates' Courts
(asked on 21st December 2017) - View Source
Question to the Ministry of Justice:
To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what proportion of the total work undertaken in magistrates' courts was presided over by (a) lay magistrates and (b) district judges in each year since 2010.
For each year since 2010 the data are set out in the following table[1]:
Year | Judiciary | Proportion of all hearings (%) |
2010 | Magistrates | 90.9% |
| District Judges (MC) | 9.1% |
2011 | Magistrates | 90.8% |
| District Judges (MC) | 9.2% |
2012 | Magistrates | 89.8% |
| District Judges (MC) | 10.2% |
2013 | Magistrates | 89.5% |
| District Judges (MC) | 10.5% |
2014 | Magistrates | 89.5% |
| District Judges (MC) | 10.5% |
2015 | Magistrates | 90.1% |
| District Judges (MC) | 9.9% |
2016 | Magistrates | 90.2% |
| District Judges (MC) | 9.8% |
Magistrates and District Judges (Magistrates’ Courts) bring different but equally valuable skills to our justice system and the magistrates’ courts. We continue to work with magistrates to ensure they have as full a role as possible.
[1] ‘Provides the percentage of cases that have a hearing listed in the specific periods, and where a case is listed for hearing more than once in each period, it will be counted each time it is listed. It is possible for a single defendant to have more than one cases listed at the same time. The data is a report on all criminal cases (including terrorism, extradition and Single Justice Notice proceedings), along with civil and enforcement cases, but will exclude family cases heard by the magistrates’ courts judiciary in the Single Family Court. It is possible to have magistrates sitting with District Judges at the same session; where this occurs, the case will be counted under both categories.