Examination of Witnesses (Questions 40-59)
CROWN PROSECUTION
SERVICE
8 MARCH 2006
Q40 Mr Davidson: In terms of the
NAO Report, are you saying to me then that you were already covering
all of the things that are in there, all of the areas that were
examined?
Mr Macdonald: No.
Q41 Mr Davidson: No. If not, why
was your system not sufficiently rigorous to have been doing so
already?
Mr Macdonald: I was going to go
on to say that as we were moving from the split units to the combined
units, I am sure we would have done this. I am sure this is what
we would have done.
Q42 Mr Davidson: You would have got
there eventually.
Mr Macdonald: We would have got
there pretty quickly.
Q43 Mr Davidson: Many people who
come in front of us tell us that not all that much is new and
they would have got there eventually or they were just getting
there, or between the date of the NAO visiting them and the people
involved appearing in front of the PAC they have actually introduced
these changes. Can you understand why we find that a bit surprising?
Mr Macdonald: Of course I can
understand that, but what I am trying to explain is that we were
in the process of moving from split units to combined units. What
was happening in Cardiff was being replicated in Northumbria.
We have sort of delayed that reform because we need to wait to
see what shape the new police areas are going to take. I am not
suggesting that the NAO has not been absolutely clear about what
we need to do.
Q44 Mr Davidson: May I come on to
the question of how modern and up to date you are, because you
do still strike me as being one of the few unreformed and unmodernised
public services. In terms of paragraph 3.20, it says ". .
. office phones do not record messages or they are not answered
in their absence". The use of answering machines is not cutting
edge technology and I would have thought that any service that
did claim to be modern and up to date at all would have availed
itself of answering machines. Can you just clarify?
Mr Macdonald: We do use answering
machines.
Q45 Mr Davidson: So the Report is
wrong.
Mr Macdonald: No, it says the
"More extensive use of answering machines and e-mail, combined
with a team-based approach".
Q46 Mr Davidson: It says "Most
lawyers are out of the office and either their office phones do
not record messages or they are not answered in their absence".
Mr Macdonald: As I understand
it, we do have use of answering machines. I agreed that it ought
to be more extensive and the team-working point would help that.
Q47 Mr Davidson: Have you seen this
Report? You have agreed it?
Mr Macdonald: Yes, of course.
Q48 Mr Davidson: You have agreed
to the sentence which says "Most lawyers are out of the office
and either their office phones do not record messages or they
are not answered in their absence". So let us not dispute
what is said here.
Mr Macdonald: I am not disputing
it Mr Davidson. What I am highlighting is the sentence which says
at the beginning of paragraph 3.20 "More extensive use of
answering machines and e-mail" et cetera. Of course
that is right; I accept that.
Q49 Mr Davidson: "It can be
very difficult for the police, courts or defence solicitors to
contact the Crown Prosecution Service".
Mr Macdonald: I have no doubt
at all that that is an issue.
Q50 Mr Davidson: Why have you not
sorted that?
Mr Macdonald: We are sorting it.
Q51 Mr Davidson: Why have you not
sorted it already?
Mr Macdonald: You asked me about
whether we are a modernised public service. What we have been
doing over the last two or three years involves a huge modernisation
of the CPS from a very low base: the computer system, the new
roles, all of the things that I have mentioned.
Q52 Mr Davidson: This only began
two years ago then?
Mr Macdonald: No, it began in
earnest probably around 2001-02. In 2001 we did not even have
a computer on every desk and Compass was commissioned as a computer
system about 2002.
Q53 Mr Davidson: Do you think that
culture has been removed from the service then?
Mr Macdonald: No, I do not. We
are battling it, we are making some progress against it, but we
still do have an old-fashioned culture. I accept that.
Q54 Mr Davidson: That is one of the
key issues for me in all of that. I am not clear, in terms of
either the Report or what you have said so far, how vigorously
you are approaching this question of cultural change.
Mr Macdonald: I can only say to
you that our major theme at present in the CPS is cultural change
and performance management. We are addressing it very vigorously
with the new roles we have, the new powers; it is the key thing
for us to address.
Q55 Mr Davidson: May I just come
back to this question of successes, about the conviction rate
of 81% in magistrates' courts? This relates back to the point
which was made earlier on about only picking winners. I want to
clarify just how good that 81% figures is, given that 61% pleaded
guilty, so in a sense you could almost take that away, then 15%
failed to attend court and it was proved in their absence. If
you cannot find somebody guilty in their absence, then I would
not have thought you could find them guilty anywhere.
Mr Macdonald: I do not want to
interrupt, but when you say that you can take away the guilty
pleas, people plead guilty because an unanswerable case is assailed
against them. That is not to be taken away, that is us doing our
job properly, getting pleas of guilty in the face of strong cases.
I am not happy to take that away.
Q56 Mr Davidson: I was taking your
observation about 50/50. Presumably people would reckon by and
large they had a 50/50 chance of being found guilty or not.
Mr Macdonald: No, not at all.
Some cases we prosecute we think it is maybe a low 50s; some cases
will be absolute certainties. It depends where you are in the
range.
Q57 Mr Davidson: You only actually
get 5% guilty after a trial as compared with 2% that are acquitted
on the trial date. Out of the 100% that actually go to trial,
it is only 5% and 2% really that are being acquitted.
Mr Macdonald: The figure is about
73%.
Q58 Mr Davidson: Only 2% are being
acquitted.
Mr Macdonald: The overall figure
is about 73%.
Q59 Mr Davidson: On the basis of
the figures that I have in front of me here, and you have seen
the Report, 13% were discontinued by yourselves. To what extent
can we be convinced that you are not letting a lot of cases go
simply because you are over-burdened?
Mr Macdonald: We are certainly
not doing that and, if you are suggesting this, there is certainly
no sort of policy to that. We are not doing that. If the conviction
rate of contested cases is of that order, given that our test
of prosecution is anything over 50% that is about the right figure.
It should not be much higher or much lower. It is about right.
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