‘It’s a huge privilege to be an MP. At the Bar, you have clear enough outcomes – wins and losses. In politics you can advocate and persuade, but the outcomes are more ephemeral. The life of an MP can be frustrating but also hugely rewarding. We often complain. But we shouldn’t!’

I am with Andy Slaughter MP for Hammersmith and Chiswick, Chair of the influential Commons Justice Committee since September 2024. A late entrant to the Bar, nearly all of his 20-year Commons career has been spent in the justice area.

Slaughter grew up in Fulham. ‘The family goes back in London for several generations. Working class/lower middle class. Dad was a bookkeeper; Mum, after raising us, worked as a dinner lady and a secretary. They left school in their early teens. My early education was in special needs owing to very bad asthma.’ He later attended the nearby Latymer Upper School, ‘an interesting school, liberal with a small “l”, with a big catchment area. It’s in my constituency. I still visit it and have links with it.’

He was ‘fairly academic’ at school. How did he fare for A levels? ‘I enjoyed life, let’s say!’ We leave it at that. He couldn’t have been too awful because he was in the first generation of his family to go to university. ‘I studied English at Exeter, then worked in public affairs, including for the Bar Council, working with Bob Alexander when he was Chair of the Bar. I was in Parliament for a couple of years as a researcher, then at the BBC. I was looking for something media-related. I wasn’t politically active at university. I joined the Labour Party in the run-up to the 1983 general election and became a Labour councillor in Hammersmith and Fulham at the age of 25.

‘I had no family background in law. I’m not sure I had even met any lawyers until I joined the Labour Party, which was full of them. I thought it would be an interesting life and decided to retrain for the Bar.’ Why the Bar? ‘I liked the advocacy – I was already doing it in politics in different situations. I couldn’t be a solicitor. I couldn’t do the accounts. I’m almost completely innumerate!’

Slaughter was called in 1993. ‘I did my first six at Doughty Street. There was a young up-and-coming barrister there called Keir Starmer.’ Second six, and most of his period of practice, was at Bridewell Chambers. There was an unsuccessful attempt to get into Parliament at the Uxbridge by-election immediately after the 1997 general election. During this time, he was still serving on the Hammersmith and Fulham council and he became Council leader. Eventually he was selected in 2004 to stand for – conveniently – Ealing, Acton and Shepherd’s Bush. ‘By then nearly everyone I ever knew to be on a shortlist over the years had become an MP! In the run-up to the 2005 election I concentrated on getting to know the constituency. I didn’t take on new work in Chambers.’ His election effectively put an end to his busy practice. He moved to Lamb Chambers in 2006 as a door tenant.

He began to learn his trade on the lowest rung of the ministerial ladder. ‘I became a Parliamentary Private Secretary, an unpaid bag-carrier, at the Transport department and later the Foreign Office, where I looked after two Peers – Mark Malloch Brown and Digby Jones – in Gordon Brown’s “Government of all the Talents”. The justice connection began in 2010, by which time, following boundary changes, he had just moved to the Hammersmith seat. Labour was now in opposition. He was made Shadow Justice Minister, serving for nearly six years. Later shadow appointments included Solicitor General. ‘Being a barrister led me into Justice. It’s a good brief to have in Opposition. You can argue about what the law should be. In contrast, being shadow housing minister – which I have also been – is miserable. You can see what needs to be done, for example building more social housing, but you can’t do much about it.’

Resignations and sackings have regularly punctuated his Parliamentary career. Issues arose around his pro-Palestine, pro-EU and anti-Heathrow expansion principles. ‘I’m basically very loyal – at least I think so. The Whips may differ! I want the Party to succeed. I don’t want to be a comfort to the enemy. I resigned my Justice job during the Corbyn leadership. I was defying the Whips but I accept that there must be discipline in a party: someone has got to run the government or shadow government. But I have always found it difficult to vote against my clearly stated position on an issue, especially when I have made it clear to my constituents.’ Is it about your integrity? ‘That’s a pompous word. I prefer “consistency”. But I have no ill feeling towards my leaders. I have had three sackings but have been reappointed. Politics can be forgiving!’

The combination of independent mindedness and experience, including from working on other Commons committees, entirely fits him to chair the Justice Select Committee. ‘We are a buffer between the justice system and the government. We look right across the justice field, including at prisons, the courts and access to justice, the legal services market, legal aid and litigation funding. We can engage in strong debate about, say, the purpose of prison and the rule of law. We seek to identify the chronic parts of the justice system, and we go where the problems are. But we also encounter best practice, and we pass it on.

‘We have a good relationship with the Justice Secretary and his ministers. David Lammy has knowledge and empathy; James Timpson has the reforming drive. I’m hopeful of them. We won’t ask them to do what we would regard as impracticable. We try to be constructive as well as critical. Government respects our independence and knows it must respond properly to our reports.

‘The biggest problem is the prison system. I was a criminal barrister when I started in practice. Wormwood Scrubs was in my constituency for 20 years. I’ve seen inside prisons for nearly 40 years. It’s a real shame that we have not made more progress during that time. Prison conditions are dire. There is overcrowding; only 50% of prisoners get the opportunity to engage in work and education; education opportunities have dropped by 25%; the food and living conditions are poor; drugs are endemic, leading potentially to a dangerous culture of acceptance. Without reform prisons will remain unstable and unsafe. Then people ask: why isn’t rehabilitation working? But, first, we need to unblock, to get the numbers down, to get the right people in the right categories of prison, to tackle the staffing crisis, before we can deal with the drug addiction, the poor conduct in prisons, the lack of opportunities to learn. Even small changes could make a difference. We have got to unblock before we will start to see improvements.’

He speaks with passion. Two of his Committee’s recent reports have concerned this issue: Tackling the drugs crisis in our prisons (October 2025) and Ending the cycle of reoffending – part one: rehabilitation in prisons (November 2025).

‘And we found the prisoner releases that happened in error last year to be extremely concerning. They speak to a wider justice system at breaking point.’

Is it about resources? ‘The MOJ took the biggest hit over the last decade amongst the central departments. It is still nowhere like it needs to be. So, part of the problem is that the criminal justice system has not recovered. The CPS is struggling, under real pressure. You can’t run on empty. The lack of prosecutors contributes to backlogs, as does the shortage of judges and defence lawyers.’

The Committee has recently conducted evidence sessions with the Lord Chancellor and the Lady Chief Justice among others. ‘It now appears from its Courts and Tribunals Bill and other statements that the government is seriously intending to cut the Crown Court backlog by a combination of investment, greater efficiency and reform, including its controversial proposals on how and where cases will be tried.

‘Everyone knows about the backlog in the Crown Court. It’s leaving victims of crime and defendants waiting years for their cases to be heard. It’s got to be drastically cut. So, we welcome the removal of any cap on Crown Court sitting days, a multi-year agreement with the Lady Chief Justice and investment in the crumbling court infrastructure. Further digitalisation is also long overdue.

‘Leveson has recommended a “whole-system approach” to the criminal courts. The proposed improvements to listing, greater use of AI, “blitz” courts, more video hearings and better organised prison transport are welcome. The diversion of cases from jury trials to magistrates and judge-only hearings are only a small part of the overall package but have been the focus of opposition to the reforms, as our Committee has seen. The government now needs to explain exactly what type and number of cases will lose the right to jury trial and how much this will contribute to reducing the backlog. That evidence is what should decide how the right to jury trial is prescribed.’ Slaughter speaks in the measured tones of a Committee chair, but there is perhaps a warning here. At the second reading of the government’s Courts and Tribunals Bill he voted for the Bill but expressed reservations, principally about whether magistrates’ courts would be able to cope with the extra workload and about the processes for appeal from magistrates and for allocating cases to judge-only trials.

Advice to those starting out? ‘Talk to people, get an understanding of what a barrister’s life entails. If you decide on a career at the Bar, don’t be put off by the challenges and the difficulties. The skills you develop when training for the Bar are incredibly valuable in many other parts of life, even if you don’t end up as an independent advocate. I can tell you it’s much scarier getting up before a judge than addressing the House of Commons. In the Commons you can get away with not answering the question…’ 

In Opposition, Andy Slaughter, Labour MP for Hammersmith, speaking to protesters and supporters of The Coalition Against Heathrow Expansion in 2015.