Dispense with juries in some cases to cut the crown court backlog, ministers told

Ministers should consider abandoning jury trials for some crown court cases unless they properly fund a justice system "in serious crisis", the former lord chief justice has said.

- Emily Dugan

Lord Thomas said there had been a "political failure" by successive governments to invest in justice or make the difficult decisions needed to protect it.

The crown court backlog in England and Wales will hit 100,000 without radical action, and record delays mean that new trials are routinely being fixed for 2027. The situation is putting victims of crime through agonising waits for justice, while the accused wait years - sometimes in prison - for trial.

"You have to accept that if you want to keep the jury trial, you have to pay for it," Thomas said. "It's a choice, and a choice politicians are very reluctant to make. Do you make a major reform, or do you provide more money?"

Criminal trials with juries of 12 members, who are drawn from the public and asked to decide whether someone is guilty beyond reasonable doubt, are standard in England and Wales's 70-plus crown courts, which hear the most serious cases.

Thomas, who was head of the judiciary in England and Wales from 2013 to 2017, suggested that less serious crown court cases may have to be decided by a judge or magistrates to save money.