Question
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of the introduction in April 2015 of trial by single justice on the number of lay magistrates required.
Answered on
8 February 2016
Every year the Judiciary and HM Courts and Tribunals Service review how many magistrates are required in each local justice area; many factors influence this and it is not possible to isolate the impact of individual changes. The Single Justice Procedure applies only to cases involving adults charged with summary only, non-imprisonable offences, and aims to free-up time in magistrates' courtrooms to enable them to focus on more serious and contested cases. The government is committed to magistrates playing the strongest possible role in the delivery of justice.