The Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime, Stephen Greenhalgh, has unveiled a new online tool to help Londoners see the speed at which offenders are brought to justice, as he pushes forward the Mayor’s pledge to ensure swifter and surer justice for victims of crime in the capital.
As part of the Mayor’s Police and Crime Plan, London’s criminal justice agencies were given the goal to reduce the time taken between an offence being committed and the case concluding in court by 20 per cent to ensure that victims received faster justice.
To achieve this court cases across London would have to conclude a month earlier on average - taking 134 days in 2015/16 compared to 168 days in 2011/12.
For the first time anywhere in the country, the dashboard brings together official data from across the criminal justice system and allows Londoners to see progress against this target as well as the number of cases being brought before courts in their area and the scale of delays.
According to the dashboard, the criminal justice system is currently not on track to reach the target set by the Mayor with cases taking 165 days to complete, nine days more than cases being heard in courts in other parts of the country.
In London, the South West London Local Justice Area is experiencing the most significant delays with cases taking on average 26 days longer to complete than London average.
However despite these overall delays improvements have been made across the system in the last year with agencies now sharing data more effectively and greater collaboration to identify and resolve problems as cases pass from the police to prosecutors and on to courts.
Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime, Stephen Greenhalgh said: “For the first time Londoners are being shown the delays in our criminal justice system and they can see which court areas take the longest to deliver justice for victims. There are major challenges ahead if we want a criminal justice system in London that is swift and sure and we need to see a big improvement. Victims of crime should not have to tolerate months of delays while agencies play pass the parcel. Despite numerous government initiatives, the criminal justice system remains slow and inefficient. City Hall needs more oversight if we are going get more effective justice in the capital."
Notes to editors
- The dashboard can be viewed by clicking on the following link www.london.gov.uk/cj-timeliness
- MOPAC is committed to ensuring that London and Londoners have access to information on policing and crime so that they can see how well the police are performing.
- The data used to create the Crime Dashboard is available in its raw format on several sites including the Metropolitan Police website, and the London Datastore.