Courts Struggling To Reach Target

Figures reveal that the percentage of court cases across Scotland dealt with within the 26 week target has reached a five year low.

Research by the Scottish Conservatives shows that between 2009/10 and 2013/14, the number of Sheriff Court cases seen within the target period fell from 75.7% to 70.9% - the lowest it's been since 2009. 

Justice of the Peace courts also saw the level fall from a high of 77.8% to 73.2% over the same time period.

This is despite courts dealing with fewer cases, with the number sent to Sheriff courts falling by 14% and the number of JP court cases falling by 9%.
 
The number of Sheriff Court cases dealt with in 2009/10 was 66,000, falling to 57,000 in 2013/14, while JP court cases fell from 52,000 to 47,000 over the same period.
 
The SNP started closing courts last year despite strong objections.
 
Scottish Conservative justice spokeswoman Margaret Mitchell MSP said:
 
"These figures show the issue of delays to justice is not a new problem and that staggeringly, the backlog has been steadily getting worse for five years.
 
"The SNP has consistently and dogmatically continued to assert that closing a significant number of courts would have no detrimental effect on the progress of justice.
 
"But yet again their intransigence rhetoric and repeated assertions have been exposed as having absolutely no foundation as evidenced by these deeply disturbing figures.
 
"These delays are costly and expensive and totally unfair on taxpayers, and on victims and their families who understandably want and have a right to expect justice to be dispensed quickly.
 
"No matter what the SNP will say about the target being a guideline, the truth is that this majority SNP government’s justice system reform policies have been both inept and incompetent.
 
"Even at this late stage it is not too late for Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill to mitigate the impact of the disastrous decisions, which he and his government have taken, by reversing the decision to close so many courts."