The Leveson Court review recommends a new branch of the Crown Court - the Crown Court Bench Division.
This review would consist of a judge sitting alongside two magistrates. The court would deal with either-way offences where a judge has determined that a sentence of three years or less is likely.
At the point of sentence, the maximum sentence would be available. The report analysis is that this could lead to a 20 per cent reduction in the open caseload. Quicker for three people with some expertise to reach a verdict than a jury.
The proposal obviously requires increased recruitment of both judges and magistrates. A daunting prospect. There is a dwindling appetite for lawyers to embark on the criminal law route with unfilled vacancies in the last circuit judge recruitment campaign.
However, there is always the opportunity to entice applicants in any paid work by enhancing the career structure. For instance, it is suggested that a part-time Deputy District Judge (Magistrates’ C'ourts) might be deployed to the new court. A new experience to fast-track towards a salaried full-time role.
This remedy isn’t available to lay magistrates. The role is not about money or career. It is about commitment, principally in giving personal ‘time’. Only a small proportion of people can commit to giving a minimum of 13 days per year for 5 years, plus 10 training days in the first two years.
The harsh reality of this ‘Big Ask’ is demonstrated by the response to the £1 million recruitment campaign in January 2022. It aimed to recruit 4,000 new magistrates. The result by April 2024 was the appointment of 2,008 new magistrates.
This followed a lengthy period of recruitment freeze. So it is unrealistic to envisage an upward trend to meet the necessary increase.
A crucial point is that we desperately need to preserve and nurture the existing adult court magistrates who keep our justice machine running. Many can understandably commit only to the minimum sittings of 13 days per annum. Those sitting days ideally need to cover all types of court.
Swallowing up those limited days with multi-day trials will rapidly reduce that rich wealth of experience. Some will understandably opt for the more serious crime.
My proposal. Surely there needs to be a separate branch of the magistracy, recruited to determine verdict only. A ‘Crown Court’ magistrate.
This role would require a different level of commitment which would attract a different field of applicants. The criteria would simply be the familiar jury service checks. No need for the current 12 month selection process. Recruitment could respond quickly to needs.
The training would be short and focus principally on assessing the evidence, using the technology, and importantly, the same training on judicial conduct as the remainder of the bench. No appraisal or mentoring, but with a safety net of conduct rules so that they may be reported for disciplinary action and removal in the same way as their Magistrates’ Court colleagues.
No sentencing. There is strong argument for the judge alone to deal with sentence. In reality, a pre-sentence report will usually be required at this level of sentence, and it avoids reconstituting the bench on another date.
The time commitment could range from full-time for at least a month to justify the training input, through to availability for 2-5 days a week spread over a year or more. Shorter term to attract a wider field. This would give the wider diversity which the magistracy currently struggles to achieve.
It could include the student on vacation, the seasonal workers, those who are building up to return to the workforce, the jury enthusiast, and yes, inevitably, those who are retired.
All magistrates would automatically be eligible to sit in the Crown Court Bench Division if resources allow. However, only 27 per cent responded to the survey sent to magistrates as part of the review with less than half of them stating that they would be ‘very willing’ to sit for verdict only.
The magistracy is precious and is already stretched within its own jurisdiction. The recommendation is for a new court. My proposal is that it must carry its own resource of a Crown Court branch of the magistracy. This is essential if there is to be any likelihood of the court materializing.
