Blair wants criminal justice system 'rebalanced'

The Prime Minister has said that the criminal justice system needs to be "rebalanced" in favour of crime victims.

Tony Blair made his remarks during a speech in Bristol, in the first in a series of speeches on domestic policy entitled 'Our Nation's Future'.

The Prime Minister said that the political and legal establishment were "still in denial" and that there was a "gap between what the public expects and what the public sees is still there."

Mr Blair said: "I know what large numbers of such people believe. They believe we are on a populist bandwagon, the media whips everyone up into a frenzy, and if only everyone calmed down and behaved properly the issue would go away. It may well be true that politicians can be overly populist; it may be true that, as I know more than most, the media can distort; but actually neither reason is the reason why the public are anxious. The public are anxious for a perfectly good reason: they think they play fair and play by the rules and they see too many people who don't, getting away with it.

"By the public, I don't mean the "hang 'em and flog 'em" brigade. I mean, ordinary, decent law-abiding folk, who believe in rehabilitation as well as punishment, understand there are deep-rooted causes of crime and know that no government can eliminate it. But they think the political and legal establishment are out of touch on the issue and they are right."

Mr Blair said that the latest British Crime Survey showed that 80% of British people thought that the criminal justice system respected the rights of the accused, while only 35% said that they were confident that the system met the needs of victims.

The Prime Minister added: "This is not an argument about whether we respect civil liberties or not; but whose take priority. It is not about choosing hard line policies over an individual's human rights. It's about which human rights prevail. In making that decision, there is a balance to be struck. I am saying it is time to rebalance the decision in favour of the decent, law-abiding majority who play by the rules and think others should too."

However, Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesperson Nick Clegg said that Mr Blair's speech was an "admission of failure". He said: "It is striking that after 10 years in power, the gap between his rhetoric and reality is wider than ever.

"It is a continuing failure of government policy that is letting people down, not some nebulous 'liberal establishment' or an ill-defined need to 'rebalance' the system.

"We have prisons bursting at the seams, a judiciary at loggerheads with the government, a probation service on its knees, falling conviction rates for serious crimes, one of the highest rates of reoffending in Western Europe and a Home Office in a state of institutional meltdown.

"One speech at the tail-end of his premiership cannot absolve Tony Blair of his responsibility for this dismal state of affairs."

(KMcA/SP)