Law Society research finds access to justice 'postcode lottery'

There were more than 80,000 Crown Court cases in the backlog at the end of last year, with the five worst hit areas being south east, north east and south west London, Greater Manchester and the West Midlands. In West Mercia, cases took 34.7 months on average from offence to completion, compared to 29.4 months in North Yorkshire and 26.7 months in Wiltshire.

Mark Evans, Law Society president, said: ‘This data shows a clear postcode lottery in access to timely justice.’