19 July 2002
In Justice for all, Blunkett unveiled far-reaching plans to 'rebalance' courtroom culture by 'putting victims and witnesses at its heart'.
But he said one of the proposals – Custody Plus, which aims to tackle the overcrowding crisis in Britain's prisons by increasing the emphasis on community service – is too costly to roll out across England and Wales and will instead be piloted.
The white paper claims it could eventually 'replace all custodial sentences of up to 12 months'. It will allow convicted criminals to serve some time in prison and see out the rest of their sentence under supervision in the community.
Blunkett said: 'This will take a lot of time, preparation, training and resources. We do not have the resources within the Spending Review to implement Custody Plus in the way that it would be envisaged if it were nationwide.'
Home Office minister Lord Falconer told Public Finance: 'Custody Plus was always something that we would pilot first, so we could see precisely how it would work and what is the best sort of support to provide in the community.'
An extra £650m has been found to invest over three years in case-management computer systems across the Criminal Justice system.
Another measure in the white paper aims to cut drastically the number of jury trials. Serious fraud cases – and trials where jurors are under threat of intimidation – could be tried without juries.
Defendants could also request to be tried by a judge sitting alone. Another proposal is to double the length of sentence magistrates can impose from six to 12 months. This would mean 5,000 cases a year could be dealt with without recourse to a crown court jury.
The white paper, published on July 17, also included the relaxation of the so-called 'double jeopardy' rule, whereby a defendant cannot be tried twice for the same offence. This 800-year-old tradition could now be changed where there is deemed to be 'compelling new evidence'.
In one of the most controversial proposals, defendants' previous convictions and acquittals could be revealed in court.
PFjul2002
