Court closures

sir – Your report (May 2) about the Government’s drive to recruit magistrates seems to indicate that the fall in the number of JPS – from 30,000 in 2009 to 12,300 now – is due to the public’s lack of interest in joining their local bench.

In fact, it is the closure of courts that is the real problem. When I started on the West Suffolk bench in 1982, there were six courts in this half of the county. When I retired from the bench in 2008, the only remaining court was Bury St Edmunds. This court closed in 2016 after dispensing justice for 440 years, and now the only court in the whole county is in Ipswich. Potential magistrates do not want to have to travel long distances to sit in courts away from their local area.

Local justice has been the essence of the system since it began. Until the Courts Act in 2003, magistrates had to live within 15 minutes’ travel of their commission area.

Opening more courts, as well as recruiting more magistrates, would go a long way towards reducing the national backlog of approximately 370,000 cases still waiting to be heard. Dr Richard Soper

Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk