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Louise Thomas
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The impact of the appalling scenes on the country’s streets will be felt in the criminal justice system “for months and years”, a cabinet minister has warned.
Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood said the riots would set back Labour’s plans to fix the system, already struggling with a huge backlog of court cases and overcrowding in prisons.
She said the Ministry of Justice has risen to the challenge of “bringing rapid charges against … thugs and hooligans”, in recent days.
But she added: “The impact of these days of disorder will be felt for months and years to come. They make the job of rebuilding the justice system harder.
“They also offer a sobering reminder of how much worse things might have been had this Government not acted fast, a few weeks ago, to address the crisis in our criminal justice system before it was too late.”
In recent days more than 500 prison places have been brought forward to ensure space for those being sentenced by the courts, Ms Mahmood wrote in The Observer.
Last month, she announced plans to release some inmates early to free up prison space, blaming the last Conservative government for leaving prisons too full. Her warning came as Britain’s top prosecutor said the worst offenders faced up to ten years in jail.
Stephen Parkinson, the director of public prosecutions, said the number of charging decisions was expected to soar and talked of a “new phase” of cases set to include “more serious charges with stiffer penalties”.
While many of the prosecutions so far have been for violent disorder, which carries a maximum sentence of five years, Mr Parkinson said the more serious offence of rioting, which carries up to 10 years, was under consideration.
“We warned of the consequences and we will deliver those consequences,” he told the Sunday Times. “It’s not about exacting revenge, it’s about delivering justice.”
Mr Parkinson, the head of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), also said that Elon Musk’s comments, including his claim that the UK was heading towards civil war, were “deeply unhelpful”.
Mr Parkinson said prosecutors were likely to authorise “hundreds” more charges in the coming days and weeks, as most suspects are on bail as police gather more evidence against them.
Mr Parkinson said: “There’s inevitably going to be more police work involved to put those cases together, but the maximum sentence is ten years, rather than five years.
“We’re expecting a lot of work to come in next week as a result of those cases that have been bailed.”
On Friday former attorney general during the 2011 riots warned the recent far-right violence should be a wake-up call for the country’s broken justice system.
Dominic Grieve praised the rapid convictions of those who took part in the violence, saying they had used similar tactics in 2011 and that the authorities in recent days had “risen to the occasion”.
But, he stressed, high-profile arrests and sentences will not necessarily prevent future violence on the streets unless extensive court delays caused by years of underfunding are dealt with.
“There is a much wider and longer-term issue, which is the justice system in this country is not functioning properly,” he told The Independent. “It can rise to the occasion, as one can see in current circumstances. But generally speaking, the length of time it takes for somebody to be brought to justice is much too long.
“And I think that in a society where there are very, very long delays in dealing with ordinary criminality, it is an extremely unsatisfactory state of affairs, and that comes from persistent underfunding. In fairness to the last Conservative government, the underfunding goes back way before they came into office as the coalition in 2010, but it certainly hasn’t been improved since.”
“If justice is not routinely delivered, people lose confidence in democracy and the rule of law,” Mr Grieve added. “And I think you could even make an argument there’s a connection between that and people going out and rioting in the streets, I think it’s a bit of a wake-up call. ”
The justice system was “in a state of almost collapse,” he added.
