Restricting Jury Trials Will Undermine Free Speech, Lammy Warned
Government plans to scrap jury trials for most crimes will undermine free speech, David Lammy has been warned, with research showing juries are twice as likely to acquit on free speech grounds. The Telegraph has the story.
Campaigners claim the Justice Secretary’s proposals will mean defendants who use free speech as a defence for ‘offensive’ language are less likely to be acquitted.
Research by the Free Speech Union (FSU) found defendants justifying their actions on the basis of free speech were almost twice as likely to be found not guilty in a crown court, where juries determine verdicts, as they were in magistrates’ courts, where there are no juries.
The research followed high-profile ‘hate speech’ cases such as that of Jamie Michael, a former Royal Marine. A jury took just 17 minutes to acquit him of stirring up racial hatred with a Facebook post urging people to exercise their democratic rights over illegal immigration following the Southport murders.
Lord Young, the Director of the FSU, said his organisation would be campaigning against Lammy’s plans. “Trial by jury is a bulwark of British liberty and if people charged with speech offences are denied that right, they’re more likely to be convicted,” he said.
In an attempt to tackle a record backlog of 80,000 cases, Lammy will on Tuesday use a Commons statement to set out the Government’s ‘once in a generation’ plans to scrap the right to jury trial for defendants facing offences likely to result in prison sentences of under five years.
Under the proposals, only defendants facing charges carrying a possible jail term of more than five years, such as murder, rape and other serious sexual offences, terrorism, manslaughter, GBH and possession of firearms, will be entitled to jury trials.
Magistrates’ powers are also to be increased by extending their remit from offences carrying a maximum custodial sentence of one year to two years.
The reforms mean all defendants charged with ‘either way’ offences will be stripped of their right to elect trial by jury. These crimes, for which suspects can choose either magistrates or jury trials, include burglary, affray, fraud, some sexual crimes and criminal damage up to £10,000.
Lammy has decided to go further than proposals by Sir Brian Leveson, a Court of Appeal judge whose review of the courts crisis recommended that offences carrying sentences of up to three years should be denied the right to a jury trial.
The Justice Secretary is facing a backlash from barristers, lawyers and some judges, and has been warned that he will struggle to get the proposals through the House of Lords, particularly given his decision to go further than Sir Brian’s recommendations.
The FSU research found 16% of offences where defendants used free speech as a defence ended in acquittals in magistrates’ courts in the 10 years to 2025. This compared with 28% in crown courts.
The gap has widened in recent years with 14% acquitted by magistrates in the year to June 2025, compared with 33% in crown courts.
Worth reading in full.
Stop Press: You can read the Free Spech Union’s full report here.
To join in with the discussion please make a donation to The Daily Sceptic.
Profanity and abuse will be removed and may lead to a permanent ban.
“In an attempt to tackle a record backlog of 80,000 cases, Lammy will on Tuesday use a Commons statement to set out the Government’s ‘once in a generation’ plans to scrap the right to jury trial for defendants facing offences likely to result in prison sentences of under five years.”
Well, the backlog is the purported reason. I don’t believe them.
That’s another case of the It has a cost! argument I already mentioned here some time ago. Since everything has a cost, people argueing against it because it has a cost (takes too long to proceed) usually want get rid of it regardless of its cost. The cost is considered intolerable because of an a prioriy existing conviction that it itself is undesirable.
Considering this, it seems a safe assumption that Lammy wants to get rid of jury trials for most crimes people are usually accused of the reduce the rate of government defeats in such proceedings. After all, just locking people up without any trial is going to much cheaper and faster than anything more elaborate.
There are a host of things that can be done to reduce backlogs; night courts, abolish all hurty word offences, appoint new judges etc. The fact that he will be only recommending abolishing juries shows that the stated reasons are bollocks.
Good points!
In an attempt to tackle a record backlog of 800,00 cases, Lammy will on Tuesday use a Commons statement to set out the Government’s ‘once in a generation’ plans to scrap the right to jury trial for defendants facing offences likely to result in prison sentences of under five years.
This basically amounts to scrapping jury trials for almost everyone who’d likely benefit from being judged by a jury of his peers instead of state-employed officials because murder, rape and other serious sexual offences, terrorism, manslaughter, GBH and possession of firearms is all pretty serious stuff which needs a high amount of objectively existing evidence. Eg, nobody can be charged for illegal possession of firearms solely based on some prosecutor’s or judge’s opinion that he’s just the kind of guy who certainly must possess illegal firearms. But people can be charged of incitement for racial hatred based on such an opinion alone.
But Muslim Rape Gangs often get LESS THAN FIVE YEARS each as a prison sentence, so the whole basis of this attack on our ancient rights to a jury trial is bogus.
With regards to my text, there’s a non-sequitur here. What I meant to express is that Lammy wants to get rid of jury trials in almost all cases where people who are accused of relatively lesser offenses would actually benefit from them while keeping them as better figleaf for much more serious offenses where it’s much less likely that the jury will acquit someone the government really wanted to see convicted.
The idea behind jury trials is to ensure common sense in common proceedings.
The historian Richard Pipes in his great book about the first marxo-fascist tyranny – Russia under the Bolshevik Regime – makes the point that under leftwing despotism the criminal courts don’t function as places where guilt or innocence is determined. This is because guilt or innocence is determined by pre-existing group identity. Instead, the marxo-fascist courts function as places where punishment is determined. So of course the regime of Starmer-the-Contemptible seeks to abolish trial by jury.
“….will undermine free speech”, Lammy warned.
Excuse me; isn’t that the whole point of the exercise?
Farage should just come out and say now, if we get in at the next election we are going to reverse this on day 1.
He said this https://x.com/Nigel_Farage/status/1993415253892198897
Not a promise to repeal but a strong statement nonetheless
NO ONE has the right to abolish Trial by Jury.
End of.
Absolutely. Complete overreach.
The fundamental reason for jury trials is to ensure as far as possible that there is no State
interference in the result.
It is relatively easy for the State to ensure judges biased towards it are appointed.
The State finds it more difficult to ensure 12 men/women picked at “random” are sympathetic to it.
This is the only bloody reason – but they’re relying on the maxim” Justice delayed is Justice Denied”.
So fix the delay then, don’t abandon a system that has been around for over 800 years.
If I wasn’t so cynical I’d say it’s to ensure convictions for Misinformation etc. on line.
Just look at the state of that in the photo. What a travesty.
Restricting Jury Trials Will Undermine Free Speech, Lammy Hopes..
A couple of potential side effects occurred to me. Is it likely that there will be many more full time magistrates, rather than part time volunteers (with other jobs)? One of my cousins, who worked for the HMRC, was also a magistrate like that.
Another problem might be that if they try to catch up on a backlog, it might actually overload the prisons (assuming that they are not all on remand to start with). Even if they try to manipulate the sentences to lighten the load, there could be big spike in the admission numbers in the short term.
Despite Lee Kuan Yew’s opposition to trial by jury in a multiracial society, I would always prefer to take my chances convincing a dozen ordinary folk of my innocence than one corrupt, oikophobe judge. That’s not to say that juries always get it right, of course. Look at Lucy Letby and O.J Simpson; ”Lee Kuan Yew abolished trial by jury in Singapore, citing the persistent influence of racial and ethnic bias in jurors’ decisions in a multi-racial society. With Singapore’s diverse population, comprising significant Chinese, Malay, and Indian populations, LKY said that “tribal loyalties override impartial judgment”, making jury trials incompatible with true justice. Many of the same reasons underpinned his explanation of why liberal democracy will not work in multi-racial societies, observing: “In multi-racial societies, you don’t vote in accordance with your economic interests and social interests, you vote in accordance with race and religion.” Lee Kuan Yew reiterated throughout his career that history shows liberal democracy is not sustainable in multi-racial societies, especially those without a clear dominant majority. As Western democracies began to falter and fracture under the mounting pressures of mass immigration and identity politics in the 2000’s, he grew only more confident in that assessment.”… Read more »
Scary stuff. As long as non-whites have victimhood status in society then they can literally get away with murder if brought before certain juries;
https://x.com/zarathustra5150/status/1943706187649724699
Yes very interesting and totally agree
True but also juries, as well as now possibly making decisions on tribal lines are also, inconveniently, able to ignore laws they think are unjust. How much better to rely on judges who have to prove support for DEI to get appointed and are likely to be left indoctrinated or at least to pay lip service to get along. They are less likely to make an anti-regime decision IMO.
Restricting free speech is the whole point of the anti-democratic tyranny.