De Haut en Bas

The far reaching changes to bench structures that were brought in at the turn of the year as a result of budgetary pressures have  had a few months to settle in, and we are seeing what works well, what just about works, and what doesn't work at all.Most magistrates have been messed around to some extent. The Voluntary Early Departure programme was successful in reducing staff numbers, but because the Treasury would only make one-off sums available to fund it up to the March cut off date the whole business had to be done in a tearing hurry.
What this meant in practice was that there was little or no time for people taking over from the outgoing staff to work alongside them, as any sensible company would arrange, to pick up the myriad little tweaks and fixes that make a complex organisation function. Creating a workable rota was (and still is) pretty tricky, when some new benches have more than 400 magistrates spread over several courthouses, and those magistrates may or may not be youth or family qualified, they may or may not be chairmen, or a number of other factors need to be considered. When I see how the staff at my court have coped with being thrown in the deep end I sometimes think that it is a miracle that we have been able to function at all. The Treasury's iron fist has clamped on to staff levels so tightly that no replacements are allowed for sick leave maternity leave and holidays. This throws extra stress on the remaining staff, and in most cases their response has been a credit to them. 
Perhaps the worst thing from the magistrates' point of view is travel. As the mergers began, the Senior Presiding Judge ruled that any magistrate had to sit at any courthouse in their Local Justice Area (LJA). Unfortunately, he omitted the words 'if necessary' and as a result JPs have been sent all over the place, often for no business reason. Some LJAs use one courthouse just for trials, another for remands, and, perhaps one for youth. This means that magistrates have to move around to experience a variety of work and maintain their competences. In other cases, particularly in large geographic areas there are two or more courts that have  a mixed workload, so there is no need to move around other than to meet new colleagues. Of course it is vital to mix up the legacy benches to create over time a unified bench culture, but the price of all this travel is high, both in money and in time. Most people drive to court, but a substantial minority use public transport, which can be highly inconvenient even in London, a city that is reasonably well served with buses and trains. As an example (based upon a real person) someone who lives in Northwood, and used to be attached to Uxbridge court can be sent to Feltham to sit. The Transport for London website says that this journey takes two hours each way, with several changes of bus and train. If someone is to have four gruelling hours added to their court sitting day, there ought to be a solid business need for it. And if they pass a colleague travelling in the opposite direction, there is no excuse for the waste. As I have said before, Buckinghamshire is one LJA and a friend who lives in and used to be based at High Wycombe can be sent to Milton Keynes. The return trip is from 80 to 120 miles (the latter being apparently quicker) so a the JPs' car mileage rate it costs between £45 and £67 to get him to court. Sooner or later the penny will drop in the MoJ and the costs will be found to be unjustifiable as well as unnecessary.