In U.K Millions spent on legal cases that fail to reach court

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Last Year nearly £115 million was spent on prosecution costs and legal aid for criminal cases which were never heard in court, the spending watchdog has disclosed.
The National Audit Office (NAO) warned the criminal justice system was “not delivering value for money”, and outlined how the total included £21.5 million spent by the Crown Prosecution Service on cases which were never heard.
More than £5 million of the CPS’s £508 million annual budget was spent on preparing cases which were aborted due to “prosecution reasons” such as incomplete case files or Crown witnesses failing to turn up.
“Delays and aborted hearings create extra work, waste scarce resources, and undermine confidence in the system”
Sir Amyas Morse, head of National Audit Office
Two thirds of Crown court cases in England and Wales fail to go ahead on the day they were due to start, wasting time and money for the system, victims and witnesses, according to the new report published on Tuesday.
The NAO also found a backlog of more than 51,000 cases has built up in the Crown courts.
By September last year, the backlog had increased in size by 34 per cent over the previous 18 months even though far fewer cases are being heard overall, mainly because many trials are becoming longer and more complex, it said.
The abolition of committal hearings – in which magistrates sent more serious cases for trial by a judge in the Crown court – in 2013 had been partly responsible for the rocketing number of unheard cases, the report said.
“Initiatives to improve efficiency in one area may have unforeseen consequences,” said the NAO study.
“For example, abolishing committal hearings, which reduced pressures in magistrates’ courts, was followed by a significant increase in delays in the Crown Court, which did not have the resources to absorb the increase.”
It added: “Around two-thirds of criminal trials still do not proceed as planned on the day they are originally scheduled.
“Large parts of the system are paper-based and parties are not always doing what they are supposed to do in a timely manner. The system is not currently delivering value for money.”
The report highlighted a postcode lottery which means victims in one part of England and Wales will wait far longer for a perpetrator to be brought to justice than in other areas.
Sir Amyas Morse, head of the National Audit Office, said: “Delays and aborted hearings create extra work, waste scarce resources, and undermine confidence in the system.
“Some of the challenges are long standing and complex – others are the results of basic avoidable mistakes.
“It is essential that the criminal justice system pulls together and takes collective responsibility for sorting out the long standing issues.”