Legal representative bodies have joined calls for curbs on the power to bring private prosecutions in the wake of the Post Office Horizon scandal. Calling on parliament to examine the issue, bar chair Sam Townend KC said that those bringing private prosecutions ‘almost inevitably have a vested interest’.
Meanwhile the Law Society said it was reflecting on the need for change. Society vice president Richard Atkinson said: ‘We are reflecting on whether there’s a need to reform aspects of the law on private prosecutions and will look at the additional safeguards proposed in the Justice Committee’s 2020 report.’
Townend said two areas of concern emerged from the Post Office case. 'Before Horizon the Post Office was bringing a handful of prosecutions each year but once it was implemented in 1999, the number of prosecutions shot up to 50-80 a year,' he said. 'These stark facts ought to have given any prosecuting authority pause for thought.'
Meanwhile, he said: ‘Those bringing private prosecutions almost inevitably have a vested interest. It is important to recall that the CPS itself was created in the 1980s to remove the decision on whether to prosecute for more serious crimes from the police in order to separate the decision to prosecute from those invested in the investigation.’
Calling for parliament to review the issue ‘in a measured way’, Townend added: ‘At the very least, parliament should give careful consideration to introducing enhanced oversight, and possibly formal regulation, to ensure the power to prosecute is not abused.’
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