Question to the Attorney General:

To ask the Solicitor General, what guidance the Crown Prosecution Service provides to prosecutors when considering whether to charge people who have used force in self-defence within their own home.

Charging decisions in cases regarding householders and the use of force against intruders in England and Wales are made independently by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS).

Reasonable force may be used by homeowners to protect themselves or others if a crime is taking place inside their home. This means individuals can protect themselves ‘in the heat of the moment’ - this includes using an object as a weapon or to stop an intruder running off - for example by tackling them to the ground. There is no specific definition of ‘reasonable force’ as this will depend on each individual circumstance. A homeowner does not have to wait to be attacked before defending themselves in their home. If a homeowner has acted in reasonable self-defence and the intruder dies, they will still have acted lawfully.

However, a prosecution could follow if, for example, the attack on an intruder continues after the danger has passed or a trap has been pre-planned for an individual rather than informing and involving the police.

Guidance regarding householders and the use of force against intruders can be found at Householders and the use of force against intruders | The Crown Prosecution Service.

The CPS does not hold any data which shows the number of defendants who were homeowners prosecuted for using unreasonable or excessive force to protect themselves against an intruder in their home. To establish whether defendants were homeowners using excessive force against an intruder would require a manual review of case files and with over 440,000 defendants prosecuted by the CPS during 2024, this would be at disproportionate cost.

Data is held from 2015 showing the number offences of murder, attempted murder, and manslaughter charged by way of common law (or the Criminal Attempts Act 1981 in respect of attempted murder) in which a prosecution commenced and reached a first hearing in the magistrates’ courts. From 1 January 2015 to 31 December 2024, 12,418 such offences were charged. This figure relates to the number of offences and not the number of individual defendants. It can be the case that an individual defendant is charged with more than one offence against the same complainant. No data is held showing the final outcome or if the charged offence was the substantive charge at finalisation.