Speeches by Sackman.

“Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned.—(Stephen Morgan.)”

“Clause 6, as amended, ordered to stand part of the Bill.”

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“Question proposed, That the clause, as amended, stand part of the Bill.”

“The Crown court backlog is at a record high. Everyone in the system—victims, witnesses and defendants—is already waiting too long for justice. In that context, the Government do not believe that it is responsible to delay the commencement of clauses 3 to 5 pending the commissioning and completion of a further review, p…”

“This Bill says that judgments must be delivered at, or as soon as is reasonably practical after, the time of conviction or acquittal. It anticipates that, in the majority of cases, judgments will be delivered at that time. I am confident that our judiciary can determine when a judgment might be responsibly delivered.”

“I understand the challenge and concerns about timing, but we have heard from experienced judges how that is likely to work. Providing judgments will replace work that judges already have to do in jury trials. They will no longer have to give summing up remarks; those take time and, as we have heard, involve explaining …”

“Finally, I come to amendment 58, which would prevent the commencement of clauses 3 to 5 unless and until the Lord Chancellor had commissioned an independent review into the length of time required for a judge sitting alone to deliver a judgment following conviction, laid that report before Parliament and made a stateme…”

“This clause does not expand the circumstances in which judge-alone trials may be appropriate under the new provisions introduced by clauses 3 and 4, nor does it affect who is eligible for trials by judge alone. It provides the necessary support to operate the new provisions established by clauses 3 and 4. Its only func…”

“As part of this we are ensuring that judges provide those reasoned judgments, setting out how they reached their verdict. As I have said, that is an important safeguard against arbitrary decision making and is crucial to enhancing transparency. That extends to the existing judge-only provisions, such as in cases where …”

“I will make a bit of progress. We also need to be mindful of the burden that lengthy trials place on jurors. In this country, between January 2024 and December 2025, almost 3,000 jurors sat in trials that lasted more than six weeks. We should be mindful that trials for fraud and serious financial crime, which are withi…”

“Clause 5 is a technical but essential provision. Its purpose is to ensure that the statute book works with coherence and consistency where a Crown court trial is conducted without a jury under the new judge-alone provisions inserted by clauses 3 and 4. Many of the Acts cited in this clause currently refer explicitly to…”

“In that case I will deal with amendments 30 to 32 once I have addressed amendments 29 and 61, because they all touch on similar issues in relation to clause 4. Much has been said about the policy rationale behind this provision, and whether juries are somehow incapable of following complex trials involving fraud or fin…”

“I do not have any modelling to hand, but I can certainly take that away. If that work has been done, I will let the hon. Lady have it, but I do not have it to hand so I simply do not know. I do not want to go over old ground, but we heard in oral evidence, particularly from the panel of experienced judges, about the ti…”

“It provides for the vast majority of judgments to be handed down at the time of conviction or acquittal, not least because that makes practical sense. It also serves the benefit of some of the reasons of timeliness that the shadow Justice Minister pointed out. The “reasonably practicable” qualification is necessary, as…”

“To be clear, I intend to address amendment 29, albeit that it is not being put to a vote, and amendment 46, which was grouped with it. My hon. Friend the Member for Bolton South and Walkden referred to other amendments further ahead, but it may be convenient to deal with those when we get to them, unless you want me to…”

“I will not; I am going to make some progress. As Sir Brian’s report clearly outlines, “this is a principled reform based on the need for cases to be resolved in a more timely manner, with a forum well suited to the demands of the case.” He suggests that allowing a judge to hear these cases alone—in tightly defined circ…”

“The point that I was making is that it should be the seriousness of the case that is the sole dictator of the mode of trial, and that likely sentence is the best and most objective test that we have. We must also be mindful of how we administer a system. Sometimes, adding lots of tests not only leads to complexity and …”

“I am rejecting the addition of any other carve-outs or exceptions beyond the test of seriousness that we lay down in these measures, which is dictated by the likely sentence, the test proposed by the independent review of the criminal courts.”

“I have to make progress. Expanding the test for eligibility beyond seriousness would dilute the focus and risk undermining both the clarity of the allocation framework and the savings these reforms are designed to deliver. I therefore urge my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton South and Walkden to withdraw her amendment…”