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David Gauke’s Independent Sentencing Review has set out proposals to transform sentencing policy. The review endorses policy ideas put forward by the Bar Council including increasing the threshold for suspended sentences from two to three years and greater use of creative community punishment.
We are pleased the government has endorsed many of the proposed reforms. For years, the main parties have used sentencing as a political football wanting to appear ‘tough on crime’. Sentences have increased and we now have the highest incarceration rate in western Europe, yet crime and reoffending rates continue to go up.
Our sentencing regime should both punish and rehabilitate, ensuring offenders don’t become better criminals, but better citizens. Prison should ultimately be reserved for those from whom society needs protecting.
Achieving wholesale change is rarely cost neutral. Implementation of the recommendations and any made by Sir Brian Leveson’s Independent Review of the Criminal Courts will require a substantial injection of investment at each stage of the process: from the police right through the courts to the prison and probation service. The current crisis facing the criminal justice system must come to an end.
We have repeatedly called for greater investment in the family justice system and for the rollout of pathfinder courts. The new National Audit Office (NAO) report Improving family court services for children sets out the challenges in the family jurisdiction from the perspective of children and highlights court delays, timeliness of cases, lack of accountability and lack of data on cost-effectiveness.
The NAO report makes for sobering reading. Behind the 47,662 outstanding private and public law cases are the lives of children and their families who are stuck in the invidious limbo of uncertainty.
The report says there is no single organisation accountable to Parliament for overall performance on family justice and it recognises there is no shared understanding of ‘what good looks like’ for the children affected. The report also states that there are no broad measures of performance that could help us to better understand whether children and families feel they receive a quality service and have their issues addressed.
A more joined-up approach is essential to improving the performance of the family jurisdiction but that must go hand-in-hand with adequate funding. Cases are increasingly complex, yet access to legal aid continues to be limited. Increased investment in legal aid would improve the effectiveness of the family courts in the future.
As the NAO report states, the pathfinder courts improve the process for children and families, and they are an example of how the government can spend to save. While local authority costs increased in the pilots, direct judicial costs halved. We will continue to call for the national rollout of pathfinder courts and press for the family courts to be properly funded in the upcoming spending review.
The recent cyber incident has caused real concern for providers and applicants. My overriding priority has been pressing the LAA to prioritise restoring systems for barrister fee billing or to urgently put in place contingency measures. We’ll continue to provide updates via email.
The Council of Europe’s Convention on the Protection of the Profession of Lawyer has now been launched. The UK is one of the 17 countries that has already signed the convention. It is the first of its kind, aims to safeguard the legal profession and enables access to justice by protecting lawyers from threats, harassment, interference or reprisals. The convention also addresses our professional rights, freedom of expression, and professional associations.
I am pleased the Bar Council was able to be involved in the drafting process which ensured the convention recognised the cab rank rule. It is a much needed and timely development that we can all support.
The UK has a reputation across the world for leading, upholding and respecting the independence of judges and the rule of law. This hard-won reputation can easily be lost. The recent and reoccurring attacks on both the legal profession and judiciary continue to diminish the trust and confidence in our justice system – both at home and abroad.
Unfair comments and criticism harm the effective operation of the rule of law by associating lawyers with their clients and this also serves to confuse public understanding of the true meaning of the rule of law.
Lawyers have a unique and important role in society in maintaining the rule of law and they are also deliberately targeted because of their work – even when they are upholding our professional ethics and acting in the public interest. There should be no impunity for any attacks on the global legal profession.
Barbara Mills KC is the 2025 Chair of the Bar. She is a specialist family practitioner at 4PB and former Co-Chair of the Bar Council’s Race Working Group.
David Gauke’s Independent Sentencing Review has set out proposals to transform sentencing policy. The review endorses policy ideas put forward by the Bar Council including increasing the threshold for suspended sentences from two to three years and greater use of creative community punishment.
We are pleased the government has endorsed many of the proposed reforms. For years, the main parties have used sentencing as a political football wanting to appear ‘tough on crime’. Sentences have increased and we now have the highest incarceration rate in western Europe, yet crime and reoffending rates continue to go up.
Our sentencing regime should both punish and rehabilitate, ensuring offenders don’t become better criminals, but better citizens. Prison should ultimately be reserved for those from whom society needs protecting.
Achieving wholesale change is rarely cost neutral. Implementation of the recommendations and any made by Sir Brian Leveson’s Independent Review of the Criminal Courts will require a substantial injection of investment at each stage of the process: from the police right through the courts to the prison and probation service. The current crisis facing the criminal justice system must come to an end.
We have repeatedly called for greater investment in the family justice system and for the rollout of pathfinder courts. The new National Audit Office (NAO) report Improving family court services for children sets out the challenges in the family jurisdiction from the perspective of children and highlights court delays, timeliness of cases, lack of accountability and lack of data on cost-effectiveness.
The NAO report makes for sobering reading. Behind the 47,662 outstanding private and public law cases are the lives of children and their families who are stuck in the invidious limbo of uncertainty.
The report says there is no single organisation accountable to Parliament for overall performance on family justice and it recognises there is no shared understanding of ‘what good looks like’ for the children affected. The report also states that there are no broad measures of performance that could help us to better understand whether children and families feel they receive a quality service and have their issues addressed.
A more joined-up approach is essential to improving the performance of the family jurisdiction but that must go hand-in-hand with adequate funding. Cases are increasingly complex, yet access to legal aid continues to be limited. Increased investment in legal aid would improve the effectiveness of the family courts in the future.
As the NAO report states, the pathfinder courts improve the process for children and families, and they are an example of how the government can spend to save. While local authority costs increased in the pilots, direct judicial costs halved. We will continue to call for the national rollout of pathfinder courts and press for the family courts to be properly funded in the upcoming spending review.
The recent cyber incident has caused real concern for providers and applicants. My overriding priority has been pressing the LAA to prioritise restoring systems for barrister fee billing or to urgently put in place contingency measures. We’ll continue to provide updates via email.
The Council of Europe’s Convention on the Protection of the Profession of Lawyer has now been launched. The UK is one of the 17 countries that has already signed the convention. It is the first of its kind, aims to safeguard the legal profession and enables access to justice by protecting lawyers from threats, harassment, interference or reprisals. The convention also addresses our professional rights, freedom of expression, and professional associations.
I am pleased the Bar Council was able to be involved in the drafting process which ensured the convention recognised the cab rank rule. It is a much needed and timely development that we can all support.
The UK has a reputation across the world for leading, upholding and respecting the independence of judges and the rule of law. This hard-won reputation can easily be lost. The recent and reoccurring attacks on both the legal profession and judiciary continue to diminish the trust and confidence in our justice system – both at home and abroad.
Unfair comments and criticism harm the effective operation of the rule of law by associating lawyers with their clients and this also serves to confuse public understanding of the true meaning of the rule of law.
Lawyers have a unique and important role in society in maintaining the rule of law and they are also deliberately targeted because of their work – even when they are upholding our professional ethics and acting in the public interest. There should be no impunity for any attacks on the global legal profession.
Chair of the Bar sets out a busy calendar for the rest of the year
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