Tag: #publicservices

ICAEW chart of the week: Criminal justice

My chart this week looks at how the criminal justice system in England and Wales is performing by examining how long cases are taking to make their way through the Crown Courts to completion.

Criminal justice Line chart showing median time in days between offence and completion 210 days in 2014 Q1 rising and falling to 248 in 2015 Q2 242 in 2016 Q1 260 in 2016 Q2 and Q3 230 in 2017 Q4 245 in 2018 Q2 230 in 2018 Q3 254 in 2020 Q1 falling to 211 in 2020 Q2 rising sharply to 438 in 2021 Q3 falling to 351 in 2022 Q3 rising to 398 in 2023 Q1 falling slightly to 387 in 2023 Q2 2 Nov 2023. Chart by Martin Wheatcroft FCA. Design by Sunday. Source: Ministry of Justice, 'England and Wales criminal court statistics: Apr to Jun 2023'.

My chart this week is inspired by the Institute for Government (IfG) and CIPFA Performance Tracker 2023 published on 31 October 2023. Concluding that “government is stuck in a public service doom loop”, IfG and CIPFA together analyse how the performance of key public services has deteriorated in recent years, and not just because of the pandemic.

The chart (an expanded version of Figure 0.1 in the Performance Tracker) is based on the median time between an offence being committed and completion (conviction, acquittal or dismissal) in Crown Courts in England and Wales, according to Ministry of Justice statistics for the criminal justice system up to June 2023. 

This is a key metric in understanding how efficient the police, prosecutors and courts together are in bringing criminals to justice, as well as an indicator of just how long the lives of victims, their families, witnesses and defendants are being put on hold while cases work their way through the system.

Back in the first quarter of 2014, the median time from offence to completion was 210 days (6.9 months). This trended up to reach 248 days (8.2 months) in 2015 Q2, before hovering around that level in the years before the pandemic, with our chart highlighting how it fell to 242 in 2016 Q1, rose to 260 in 2016 Q2 and Q3, fell to 230 in 2017 Q4, rose to 245 in 2018 Q2, back to 230 the following quarter, before rising to 254 days (8.4 months) in the first quarter of 2020 at the start of the pandemic. 

The median fell to 211 days in 2020 Q2 as more complex cases were deferred during the first lockdown, increasing sharply to reach a peak of 438 days (14.4 months) by the third quarter of 2021. The time taken improved to 351 days (11.5 months) by the third quarter of 2022 as the courts started to clear the backlog, but then increased to 398 days (13.1 months) in the first quarter of 2023. The most recent data is for the second quarter, with a median average time taken of 387 (12.7 months) for cases completing in that quarter.

While there are inevitably going to be a number of complex criminal cases that are going to take a long time to be investigated and then come to trial, for the median average case to be taking more than a year to complete its journey through the justice system in England and Wales is not a good sign.

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This chart was originally published by ICAEW.

Treasury announces extra £9.5bn for public services

14 April 2020: the Chancellor has increased the coronavirus emergency response fund to £14.5bn to cover the escalating costs of dealing with the pandemic.

Easter Monday saw Rishi Sunak announce an extra £9.5bn for the NHS and public services, adding to the £5bn already included in the emergency package announced with the Spring Budget on 11 March 2020.

This brings additional funding for the NHS and public services to £14.5bn, comprising £6.6bn for health services, £3.5bn to keep the railways running, £1.6bn for local authorities, and £0.9bn for food packages and other support for clinically vulnerable people, together with £1.9bn for the devolved administrations in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Altogether, this brings the estimated cost of fiscal measures announced by the Government in response to the coronavirus pandemic to somewhere in the region of £95bn. In addition to the £14.5bn for the NHS and public services, £27bn has been announced in business rates discounts and small business grants, £5bn in enhancements to Universal Credit and housing benefit and £750m for charities. The costs of the employee furlough and self-employed income replacement schemes will depend on take-up, with estimates that these could cost around £40bn and £9bn respectively for their initial three-month terms.

This does not include the effect of collapsing tax revenues and higher welfare spending on the public finances, nor any potential costs from the £330bn of loans and guarantees being advanced to support business. As a consequence, the fiscal deficit this financial year is now almost certain to exceed £200bn, compared with the baseline of £55bn set out in the Spring Budget just over a month ago.

Martin Wheatcroft FCA, adviser to ICAEW on public finances, commented: “This is probably not going to be the last announcement of additional funding for the NHS and public services this year given the extraordinary challenges posed by the coronavirus pandemic. 

“It is positive that the Chancellor has made it clear that money will be made available to front-line services as needed, an important signal for budget holders conditioned by a decade of austerity to manage resources carefully, rather than to spend whatever it takes to achieve a critical objective.

“We can and will worry about the bill later, when the need for a long-term fiscal strategy to put the public finances onto a sustainable path will be more important than ever before.”

This article was originally published by ICAEW.