Question to the Attorney General:

To ask the Attorney General, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of the Crown Prosecution Service in charging suspects with the appropriate offence.

Her Majesty’s Crown Prosecution Service Inspectorate (HMCPSI) inspects the work of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) and reports to the Law Officers. The Code for Crown Prosecutors (the Code) provides that it is the duty of prosecutors to make sure that the right person is prosecuted for the right offence. Between 2016 and 2018 HMCPSI inspected 12 of the 14 CPS Areas in England and Wales and found that in a very high proportion of cases the CPS correctly applied the Code and that the charges proceeded with were the correct ones. HMCPSI reported that in over 94.5% of the cases they inspected the decision to charge complied with the Code; that measure relates to all the provisions of the Code and not only whether any offence charged was the correct one.