Sarah Pochin

I make my contribution as someone who served as a magistrate for 20 years. I am deeply concerned about increasing magistrates’ sentencing powers to two years of custody. That must be accompanied by rigorous training, because in reality we get good and bad, and experienced and inexperienced, magistrates on magistrates’ benches. For a lay person, removing the liberty of another is one of the biggest decisions that they can make. I am also concerned about the presumption of suspension of all custodial sentences of up to 12 months. That is what is in the guidelines, but in training, magistrates are being told that there is a presumption of suspension of sentences of up to 18 months. Punishment should not be dumbed down because of insufficient prison places. Furthermore, the Government are leaving the supervision of the requirements of community orders in the hands of the Probation Service. How can those in the Probation Service be qualified to do that, when they are not trained to do that, unlike magistrates? Even more troubling is the fact those in the Probation Service are being given the power to cancel community orders, if they feel that the offender has been sufficiently rehabilitated. This comes at a time when the Probation Service has never been so overwhelmed and underfunded. The policy of the presumptive suspension of sentences, and the removal of magistrates’ powers to decide on community orders, betray justice for victims.