THE Crown Prosecution Service in England and Wales is to be
dramatically overhauled following publication of a damning report yesterday which condemned the present system for tying down top lawyers in management duties rather than letting them get on with the law.
The 12-year-old service was intended to bring prosecutions south of the Border closer to the system operated in Scotland.
However, the report declares that the CPS has failed in its central aim of improving the effectiveness and efficiency of the prosecution process in England and Wales.
Attorney General John Morris, QC, yesterday made it clear that many of the 75 recommendations in the report of former appeal court judge Sir Iain Glidewell, following a year long inquiry, will be implemented.
Already Mr Mark Addison, Baroness Thatcher's former private secretary, has been appointed to the post of chief executive, and will be responsible for the administration of the service.
There will also be a reversal of the centralisation policy introduced by the controversial high-profile director of the CPS, Dame Barbara Mills. She did away with the post of a deputy director and ensured that major decision making was carried out in London.
Ten days before the publication of the long-awaited report, she announced that she would be giving up her position earlier than planned, although she insisted that this was unconnected to any criticism that might be contained in the report.
Administrative staff grew to outnumber lawyers by two to one and most senior lawyers were expected to devote the majority of their time to management, the report declares. The top 400 of the 2000 CPS lawyers spent less than one third of their time on casework and advocacy.
As a consequence, the CPS throws out one in eight cases where suspects have been charged by the police. This figure rises to one in four in violent cases, and 23% of those suspected of committing criminal damage. The report agrees that there ''may be some validity'' in claims that the CPS tended to discontinue cases which might be seen by judges as borderline, in an effort to ease the pressures on hard-pressed lawyers.
The service needed to move its centre of gravity from relatively minor cases in magistrates courts to serious crime handled in Crown Courts.
Following the report, the CPS will become decentralised. It will be restructured from the existing 13 regions into 42, one for each police authority south of the Border. Each will be headed by a chief crown prosecutor who will build up a much closer working relationship with local police.
Police have been disillusioned by CPS as it run at present. Some have dubbed it the criminal protection service.
The report was widely welcomed. Heather Hallett, QC, chairman of the English Bar Council, said: ''We very much welcome the emphasis that lawyers should be lawyers and concentrate on prosecuting and not pen-pushing.''
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