Proceeding contribution from David Lammy (Labour) in the House of Commons on Tuesday, 10 March 2026. It occurred during Debate on bill on Courts and Tribunals Bill.
Courts and Tribunals Bill
I know that when my hon. Friend is upset, his baritone deepens—it was not quite as deep today as it has been on other occasions. He will know that I take very seriously the review I did. I will say more about disparities in a moment, but if we look at that review, we see that it was clear that there is tremendous public trust in our juries. When I was asked by David Cameron to do the review, there was concern in some towns and cities and among some ethnic minority populations about situations where they perceived they had an all-white jury. They asked whether it was still fair. Broadly, it was found to still be fair, and there was no evidence that there were unfair trials in our magistrates courts, which do 90% of the work, or if a single judge is sitting on their own. For the reasons that I gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford West (Naz Shah), it is right that we review how the system is working and fully understand how these changes will affect the system.
Secondary information
- Type
- Proceeding contribution
- Reference
- 782 c191
- Session
- 2024-26
- Chamber / Committee
- House of Commons chamber
- Subjects
- Courts Juries Evidence Family proceedings Magistrates Parental responsibility Reform Tribunals Victims Witnesses Sexual offences Trials Video recordings Independent Review of the Criminal Courts Central Criminal Court
- Legislation
- Courts and Tribunals Bill 2024-26 to 2026-27
- Link
- View this Proceeding contribution on hansard.parliament.uk
Librarians' tools
- Timestamp
- 2026-03-11 11:28:37 +0000
- URI
- http://hansard.intranet.data.parliament.uk/Commons/2026-03-10/26031040000194
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- http://indexing.parliament.uk/Content/Edit/1?uri=http://hansard.intranet.data.parliament.uk/Commons/2026-03-10/26031040000194
- In Solr
- https://search.parliament.uk/claw/solr/?id=http://hansard.intranet.data.parliament.uk/Commons/2026-03-10/26031040000194