Justice & Home Affairs
46mentions · last 12 months↓
View full analysis →Commons Justice Committee scrutinises the administration of justice and the work of the Ministry of Justice. Operating as a House of Commons select committee, it calls witnesses to give oral evidence and examines policy and practice across courts, prisons, probation and legal services. Recent sessions have focused on the Ministry of Justice's courts and prisons reform programme and the Courts and Tribunals Bill's provisions on trial bias and diversity. The committee has examined access to justice issues including regulator oversight and funding for the Independent Legal Casework Agency, alongside pre-appointment hearings for senior appointments including the Law Society Board Chair and Office of the Legal Complaints Commissioner Chair. Work on probation services has covered rehabilitation and resettlement delivery across different regions in Wales, Greater Manchester and Kent, Surrey and Sussex, whilst inquiry sessions have explored employment support in rehabilitation and its connection to reoffending rates.
24 sessions published in the last 12 months · busiest week: w/c 23 Mar (2 sessions)
Click any cell in the heatmap to see the sessions held that day and the insights extracted from them.
346 insights
07 Jul 2026
The Committee scrutinised the Immigration and Asylum Bill’s plan to replace parts of the first-tier tribunal with a new Independent Immigration Appeals Authority (IIAA) and non-legally qualified adjudicators. Witnesses broadly argued that the real bottleneck lies in poor Home Office initial decision making, legal aid deserts, and fluctuating policy-driven surges, not just tribunal capacity. They warned that the Bill risks lowering decision quality, weakening independence, creating a backlog shift from one part of the system to another, and exposing the new body to legal challenge, especially because the Secretary of State would control key appointments and time limits.
30 Jun 2026
The Committee scrutinised CPS performance on court backlog, custody time limits, charging delays, victim attrition, and the handling of high-profile cases. Stephen Parkinson said the Crown court backlog had stabilised but delays remained severe, with some trials listed to 2030, and identified victim attrition as his biggest concern. He set out CPS reforms on emergency-worker assaults, disproportionality monitoring, joint working with police, improved victim support, rape case review and guidance, hate-crime charging speed, and the response to Palestine Action prosecutions and public disorder. He also accepted failures around the Kneecap case flagging and the Valdo Calocane language around “consultation”, and argued that a power to discontinue Crown Court cases would improve the right-to-review scheme and victim experience.
23 Jun 2026
The Justice Committee scrutinised the Attorney General and Solicitor General on how the Law Officers’ offices operate in practice, with a strong focus on rule of law, legislation quality, international law, criminal justice oversight and superintendence of the CPS and SFO. Lord Hermer set out that his office’s core function remains giving prompt legal advice, but said his key new priority is promoting the rule of law through a dedicated unit, public legal education, and guidance to Ministers on secondary legislation, Henry VIII powers and ouster clauses. The ministers defended the Government’s approach to the Middle East and Chagos as legally compliant, said the immigration appeals reform would be designed to meet rule of law and Human Rights Act standards, and resisted calls for a formal ICJ response document on the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Ellie Reeves detailed CPS work on VAWG, a £5 million domestic-abuse pilot, the unduly lenient sentence scheme, and reforms to victim notification and time limits. The session also exposed committee concern about SFO disclosure failures, the delayed Fisher response, and the need for stronger oversight, while Lord Hermer confirmed he had ordered the AGO to stop using X.
16 Jun 2026
The Committee scrutinised the Ministry of Justice’s rehabilitation and resettlement programme, with Lord Timpson arguing that the Sentencing Act is central to managing prison capacity, diverting people from custody and shifting resources toward probation. The panel set out major reforms and investments in probation, electronic monitoring, housing on release, and digitisation to reduce release-in-error, while acknowledging pressures still to come in September and next April. Key commitments included continuing implementation of the IPP action plan, halving homelessness on release by the end of Parliament, expanding women’s diversion and intensive supervision, and reducing probation workload through staffing, digital tools and risk-based supervision.
10 Jun 2026
The Committee’s pre-appointment hearing scrutinised Professor Lynne Berry’s suitability to chair the Judicial Appointments Commission, focusing on her leadership style, independence, handling of commissioners, and relationship with the chief executive. The substantive policy discussion centred on the Government’s expectation that the JAC should move faster, review its processes, and help widen the judicial pool while preserving merit. Berry backed a more outcomes-focused and less bureaucratic selection system, supported clearer pathways into the judiciary, and questioned whether targets are the best tool for improving diversity, while emphasising the need to maintain public confidence, independence and integrity.
09 Jun 2026
The Committee scrutinised the Ministry of Justice’s response to access-to-justice failures across legal aid, civil and criminal representation, legal support funding, tribunal backlogs and the Legal Aid Agency cyber-attack. Ministers said the Government’s first priority has been to stabilise a “managed decline” system through fee uplifts, targeted investment and IT transformation, while promising to publish its means-test review approach in the summer. The panel also signalled interest in a national legal service, remote and AI-assisted access, and wider funding ideas such as ILCA, but stressed that implementation must be robust and secure. The sharpest exchanges concerned the scale of unrepresented defendants, legal aid deserts, the long-term sustainability of duty solicitors and the delayed notification/compensation implications of the LAA data breach.
30 Jun 2026
23 Jun 2026
30 Jun 2026
30 Jun 2026