The police, rather than independent prosecution lawyers, should have the power to charge suspects in most cases, three senior police chiefs have said, as they warned of a deepening crisis in the justice system.
The controversial change is being called for by the chief constables of the West Midlands, Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire forces, respectively the second, third and fourth biggest in England after the Met, the Guardian has learned.
They say the Crown Prosecution Service should be stripped of having the sole power to authorise charges in most cases, helping to drag the justice system out of a worsening crisis. This would include for crimes such as domestic abuse, harassment, burglary, robbery, theft, knife crime, and violent crime.
The chiefs say delays in charging suspects are leading to the guilty walking free and delayed justice, as victims and witnesses tire of long waits. They say the CPS – which faced government cuts under austerity – should concentrate on the most serious cases, but is “far too thinly spread” to manage its current workload and increasingly complex cases.
The police chiefs say sticking “plasters” no longer work and radical change – in effect a return to the way things were before the CPS was created in 1986 – is necessary and could be enacted quickly.
In an unprecedented intervention, the three police chiefs say: “The ability for the CPS to give timely charging advice (namely while the suspect is under arrest and in the cells) is broken; not because of anything the CPS has done, but because they do not have the resources or the people to do what they used to.
“We have tried to fix it together over the last two years, but the plasters are not sticking and things are getting worse. So for the sake of victims, witnesses and all in the criminal justice system, we need to replace it now, by restoring to the police the ability to charge most offences whilst suspects are in the cells.”
The call is made by Craig Guildford who leads the West Midlands force, Stephen Watson of Greater Manchester police and John Robins of West Yorkshire police.
All three senior police chiefs told the Guardian: “The director of public prosecutions needs to give the right back to the police to make charging decisions there and then in far more cases: domestic abuse, harassment, burglary, robbery, theft, knife crime, violent crime.
“We used to do this, officers want it, victims want it, defence lawyers want it, and we are sure the courts do too, but the system keeps saying no. We are trying to help free up CPS and partner agency work to do what they should be doing – prosecuting, not administration.”
The causes of big backlogs in the justice system include cuts made by the government as part of austerity, with that then exacerbated by the turmoil caused by Covid and subsequent lockdowns.
Police in England and Wales report that their charging rates of suspects plummet in recent years.
The three senior chief constables say: “Where is the evidence to support our call? In March 2015, 16% of crimes were resolved with a charge and/or summons and now it is 5.6%..
“This is not because police have suddenly become less effective. It is because of so called ‘attrition’ where victim disengagement occurs and results in fewer charges due to time delays and a feeling of being unsupported by a seemingly faceless and insensitive system.”
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Watson, reputed to be one of the favourite police chiefs of the home secretary, Suella Braverman, told the Guardian that long waits led to the lifeblood of the justice system – victims and witnesses willing to testify and support prosecutions – giving up.
“We lose victims and witnesses in the process. Nothing reassures victims and witnesses like a charge – it’s validation. Delays lead to victims and witnesses losing faith in the system,” he said.
The claim by the three senior chief constables – that the crisis is worsening – is embarrassing for the Conservatives – who made the cuts in the first place, and for the government also as it claims to be fixing the problem.
The police chiefs say: “The CPS like many other public bodies, including the police and courts, had to change through austerity, we all get that and it led to a commensurate reduction in capacity. Yet we appear to be trying to do the same things, despite some elements of the system being broken through no fault of any agency.”
The call will be seen by some critics as self-serving. Policing is under fire for scandals involving its own officers’ wrongdoing and for a perceived decline in effective crime-fighting.
Jo Sidhu KC, a barrister and former chair of the criminal bar association, said the police chiefs’ plan was no substitute for proper funding and risked merely shifting the problem. He said: “Simply giving the police more responsibility for charging suspects will do little to reduce the unprecedented delays and huge backlog that have accumulated over recent years and which are now baked into the criminal justice system as a result of a deliberate government policy of neglect and disinvestment.
“If a wrong decision to charge is made by the police then it is the CPS who will have to step in to reverse it, causing unnecessary additional delays and further distress to complainants. If the police wrongly fail to charge a suspect then this can also cause real injustice.”