Coroners and Justice Bill
12:00 pm
Gillian Guy: The concerns are in terms of ensuring that justice is seen to be done. That is clearly about ensuring that the procedure is in the best interests of getting to the truth, but it is also about expediting the procedure. Some of the damage that is inflicted on witnesses and victims is often because of the long drawn-out process of trying to get into courts in the first place and, as Juliet said, the long travelling distances involved. People sometimes hang around for days and have to go backwards and forwards, and that does not help the situation or people’s anxiety. Expediting the procedure has helped.
Arriving at a decision quickly is good for witnesses, but I do not think that we want to lose the primary objective of justice by overriding the rights of the defendant. The decision ought to be made in the interests of the case, not the individual.