Defending trial by jury is crucial in a society where democracy is being eroded

David Lammy’s proposals to reduce the public’s role in criminal cases will further undermine trust in a justice system already under strain

- Kenan Malik

Henry Fonda, fourth from right, in the 1957 court drama 12 Angry Men. Alamy

“Criminal trials without juries are a bad idea,” tweeted David Lammy in 2020, after the Tory justice secretary Robert Buckland had suggested restricting the right to jury trials as a means of reducing a huge backlog of court cases. “You don't fix the backlog with trials that are widely perceived as unfair.”

Except, it would seem, when you gain power. According to reports last week, Lammy, the current justice secretary, is set to abolish the right to jury trial in most cases aside from those involving murder, manslaughter and rape. The backlog today — just shy of 80,000 — is almost double that in 2020.

Last December, the government appointed the retired senior judge Brian Leveson to review the crisis. The first part of his report, published in June, suggested, among other measures, creating a judge-only division of the crown court to try many cases that today would be heard by a jury. Lammy’s draft proposals go even further in denying the right to a jury trial.

They are, though, unlikely to have much impact on the backlog. Leveson acknowledged that the primary causes were “long-term constraints and reductions in funding and investment in criminal justice” exacerbated by “the disconnect between different agencies” and “the increasing complexity of criminal law”. Such issues will not be addressed by cutting down the jury system.