Scottish justice cannot continue to turn a blind eye to thousands of suspected crimes

Justice must not only be done, it must be seen to be done. The emphasis of this time-honoured saying has always been on the importance of court proceedings being conducted in public. The first part was almost taken for granted.

However, every year, thousands of court cases result in no judgment being made simply because the authorities run out of time. Between 2019/20 and 2023/24, 9,168 cases were dropped because they fell foul of statutory time-bar limits or owing to delays by the police and other agencies.

Now the chief executive of the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, John Logue, has warned that ending longer time limits introduced during the pandemic means they must indict around 2,000 cases by November, double the normal number.

Court cases should not be dropped because the justice system runs out of time (Picture: Andrew Milligan) | PA

An absolute outrage

He described this as “the biggest challenge we’ve had to face for a number of years”, and added that the increased number of cases could add to delays in the wider criminal justice system, which he said was “already at capacity”.

“There's no point in us being able to solve our part of the problem by doubling the number of indictments, when the rest of the system has to cope with twice as many” cases, Logue said in an interview as part of The Scotsman’s Justice Denied series.

Given the state of public services – long NHS waiting lists, GPs in financial trouble, universities in financial trouble, schools struggling with pupils’ bad behaviour and sliding down international league tables, prisons so overcrowded that inmates must be released early – it should perhaps be no surprise to hear that justice is being denied because the system is overwhelmed.

However, it is an absolute outrage and a betrayal of the victims of crime. It cannot continue. The system must be made fit for purpose.

In the meantime, time limits should be extended to ensure cases eventually come to court. This is unfair on all concerned, most especially innocent people jailed on remand while awaiting trial. The alternative, however, that Scottish justice simply shrugs its shoulders and turns a blind eye to crimes it does not have time for is even worse.