I am delighted to be here today. I am also delighted to have heard Lord Justice Judge and Ken Macdonald in effect accepting that all those in the Criminal Justice System (CJS) accept there is a need for a fundamental change in the way in which the system works. The CJS is a public service. It must serve the community. It must be just. Without justice it would have no respect. Therefore, justice is an absolute given, which must not be compromised. The public must have confidence it understands the needs of victim and witness. It must not be perceived as a service for those who work in it. It must visibly connect with the community, not be separate from it.
The problem of the ineffective trial, the badly prepared case, the game playing as Sir Robin Auld described it in his report, the obscure rules of evidence, the lack of urgency about the system, the inefficiencies. These are the issues we are addressing today. And the commitment shown by the people who have already spoken to address those issues is very heartening, but we are all agreed there is a long way to go. Not in a way which compromises justice. But in a way which recognises that the CJS must stand out as an outstandingly well run public service in which the public have faith.
That aim is my priority. The constitutional reforms which we announced 10 days ago are very important. They will bolster for example the separation of judges from politics. They will also allow the Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs to focus on driving a more effective justice system, particularly the CJS. They are reform with a purpose - to produce a CJS which people trust and above all respect. That respect is vital if we are to drive individual cases through the system.
The role of Courts in this is vital. Their authority is vital. We will not catch every criminal, or prevent every crime. But the public must know that the CJS is good at what it does. That offences aren't committed on bail, that cases take place when they are listed, that the defendants do turn up on the day and if they don't they pay a price, that the prosecution case is properly prepared, that sentencing connects with the community and that sentences are enforced - fines paid, community punishments complied with, prices paid, if necessary by custody, if those conditions are not met.
Critical to this is clear unity at every level. Local Criminal Justice Boards are critical to this. I believe that good progress has been made. At all levels there must be one joined up system. It must be a system. The agencies (the Police, the CPS, the Courts Service, Youth Offending Teams, the Prison service, the Probation service, solicitors and barristers) must work together. Of course police, prosecutors and courts must keep their independent decision making. But we will never improve the administration of the CJS unless there are shared goals, shared outcomes, and shared priorities. There needs to be genuine joint working in making the system works better. We must demonstrate this nationally.
We must integrate improvements to case management through the Case Preparation Project with the charging pilots and with victim and witness care projects. The new arrangements announced on the 12th June provide that opportunity. I am determined that we, in the criminal justice system, should take that opportunity. Ken Macdonald was absolutely right - we've been here before, but this time, however, I believe the combination of the commitment of those who work in the system, the determination and drive from the government and the desire of the public will ensure we are successful. I will continue to chair the National Criminal Justice Board for the next 6 months to demonstrate the unity.
We must have a criminal justice system which the public trust and respect. All the agencies must work together to achieve this.
As previous speakers made clear, there are some long-standing problems in the criminal justice system.
63,000 trial hearings a year do not go ahead on time;
Over half of all witnesses who attend court do not give evidence;
Defendants in custody are brought to Court only for the hearing not to go ahead - an unnecessary cost and disruption; and
The police waste hours waiting at Court, only to have to return all too often another day. A wasted day for a police officer costs the taxpayer £350 per day.
All too often I am told these problems are "intractable". It is said "This is just the way the system works, and the public has to accept them".
The system doesn't have to be like that. The public shouldn't have to put up with it. There are areas in the country where the discontinuance rate is very low, where the speed within which cases are brought on is good, where the level of ineffective trials is low.
We all know, and accept that the problems which bedevil the system, and which so exasperate the citizen when he or she gets involved in the criminal justice system can only be solved if there is deep-seated, sustainable genuine cross-agency working.
There must be one Criminal Justice Reform Programme. We in central government accept that unreservedly. We have already done much to give it leadership, and provide impetus to the specific changes the system needs. The criminal justice reform programme will be led jointly by David Blunkett, the Home Secretary, the Attorney General and myself, and will come under the direction of the National Criminal Justice Board.
Make no mistake - the Home Secretary, the Attorney General and myself are absolutely united in our determination to improve radically the performance of the criminal justice system, and accept, absolutely the need for clear and united leadership to deliver it.
The public expect to see improvements. They need to know how criminal justice areas are performing. They are not particularly interested in why their case got adjourned. They want to see certainty and quality in the way the system deals with the case they have become involved in as a witness or a victim. Of course they want justice, of course they want fairness, but above all they want a system which is reliable. They need to have some method of judging how their area performs. So from the autumn of this year we will be publishing information about performance of criminal justice areas, showing for example how quickly cases are brought on, or how many ineffective trials there are in the area. This is not a court issue. It is a cross-agency issues. The tables are not just about the courts. They are about the performance of all the agencies.
it is important to identify the strands of work which are contributing to the criminal justice reform programme:
Targeting persistent offenders and tackling system weaknesses that prevent offenders being brought to justice - thereby Narrowing the Justice Gap;
Getting the charge correct - right at the outset of a case. New Charging arrangements are being tested and legislative change is included in the Criminal Justice Bill;
A National Victims and Witness Strategy to assist agencies in supporting, protecting and encouraging victims and witnesses to come forward to report crime;
Delivering enabling technologies to criminal justice agencies, led by Criminal Justice IT, to facilitate effective communications between all the agencies, for example, secure e-mail.
Today we are talking about case management. Too often we all hear the excuse "it's not my responsibility" or "it's not my fault". We are going to clarify who is responsible for doing what in case management and to what standards. From the point of charge through to disposal, the responsibilities of the defence, the prosecution, the police, and court management will be clearly defined. So that all involved will know clearly on what must be done, and by when, to prepare a case for trial and ensure an effective hearing takes place on the day it is scheduled.
We will establish a new case progression function for the courts, the prosecution, the police and uniquely for the defence. A named individual will be responsible and identifiable in every case. Under the supervision of the Court, the judiciary and the magistracy, and working as a team, these officers will be responsible for:
But there is a new deal here. There will also be an expectation that - armed with a more definite hearing date - the defence and prosecution will come to the hearing fully prepared. And if there is disagreement on how best to list a case, the bottom line will be, as now, that a judge, magistrate or legal advisor will make the final decision.
To achieve the improvements we want, we will publish a new National Listing Framework applying to Crown and magistrates' courts in the spring of 2004. The Framework will give guidance and share good practice on the effective use of different types of pre-trial hearings, block listing of cases and active case management to ensure that the needs of all court users are taken into account when arranging hearings.
To provide greater certainty, we are testing in Essex, Bedfordshire and the West Midlands new listing schemes that provide a far higher proportion of trials as fixtures in the Crown Court, and reduce the use of warned lists - which inevitably provide less certainty for witnesses. We will share the learning from these schemes with other areas this year, and include them in the National Listing protocol that will be published next year.
What I've said places a heavy emphasis on people doing their jobs - and fulfilling their responsibilities. I think it's reasonable to ask "What will happen if people don't perform their duties?". These changes have to be sustainable - we need to permanently change the way that people approach their work - this is not a "here today, gone tomorrow" gimmick. We are very serious about the sustainable nature of this.
We will put in place incentives to encourage people to fulfil their clearly defined responsibilities. Incentives are likely to be more successful than sanctions in changing peoples behaviour. For the lawyers, this will mean reviewing the fee structure to ensure it rewards early and proper preparation in accordance with newly established quality standards.
The role of training should not be under-estimated. Every agency, the Judicial Studies Board and the professional bodies have an important role to play here.
But we cannot tolerate repeated failure. Repeated failure will mean, for example, that the Legal Services Commission will work with legal firms to identify the causes of failure and agree action plans to remedy problems.
Others involved, such as the courts, the CPS and the police will have their performance monitored by the Local Criminal Justice Boards.
Some of you may have already voiced your concerns about how these proposals will be implemented in the face of disruptive behaviour by defendants.
Realistically, we can't make every defendant co-operate - if anyone can prove me wrong, I'd be delighted to hear their views - but we can look at ways of making it much harder to play the system.
We can't ignore defendants who refuse to give their lawyers instructions, fail to keep appointments with their legal advisers or fail to attend Court hearings.
One idea is to ask judges to insist as a condition of bail on regular contact by the defendant with their lawyers. Breach of these conditions might lead to either a spell in custody or a community punishment.
What is the role of defence practitioners in assisting the court? We fully recognise the constraints of a lawyer's duty to their clients but this must not be allowed to hide needless inefficiency. One suggestion might be for them to give the Court an early indication if their client has failed to give instructions, for example. It should not be incompatible with professional ethics for defence lawyers to insist on their clients obeying the courts' directions. It is often in the defendant's interests to do so and lawyers should be under a duty to promote such co-operation.
These changes demand a central role for the judiciary and the magistracy in ensuring that all the criminal justice agencies are working more effectively together. This will require an active and, where necessary interventionist approach to judicial case management. While it will - and should - remain the responsibility of parties to prepare cases properly, the judge will oversee this preparation from a case's first arrival in court until it is ready for trial. The project will introduce to criminal proceedings the fundamental concept of a Judge or magistrate as a Case Manager.
Criminal justice reform is an absolute priority of the government. It requires unified leadership. It requires a sense of urgency. It requires commitment from the people working in the system. I believe the time is right for this. I believe that the people working within the system are just as keen as the public, and the government to deliver change. Now we have the opportunity, let's show we can do it. A criminal justice system which is an outstanding public service is something the people working in it can deliver. It is what the public deserve.