§ Mr. RedmondTo ask the Parliamentary Secretary, Lord Chancellor's Department what is the current average waiting time for trial at(a) magistrates courts and (b) Crown courts for (i) defendants granted bail and (ii) those remanded in custody in (1) Doncaster, (2) Barnsley, (3) Rotherham and (4) Sheffield.
Mr. John M. TaylorFor the magistrates courts the average time from listing to completion for indictable and either way offences for the named metropolitan districts in 1993 were as follows:
Weeks Doncaster 7.0 Barnsley 12.0 Rotherham 7.4 Sheffield 8.6 However, the Barnsley figures are less reliable statistically than the others as only a small number of defendants was surveyed. Given the sample sizes, these figures cannot be broken down to show defendants granted bail and those remanded in custody without producing unrepresentative results.
453WThe average time from committal for trial to arraignment or start of trial for defendants dealt with at the Crown court centre in Doncaster during four months to the end of March 1994 was 17.6 weeks for those remanded on bail and 13.5 weeks for those remanded in custody. The corresponding times for the centre in Sheffield were 24 weeks and 17.5 weeks respectively. Barnsley and Rotherham do not have Crown court centres.