March 29, 2021
Rebecca Chalkley talked to The Law Society Gazette about Private Prosecutions in a piece entitled “Are private prosecutions getting out of control, or do we need more?”
Rebecca commented that many Private Prosecutions are better resourced than Public Prosecutions and consequently are often undertaken to a higher standard than the CPS resources will allow.
Furthermore, due to the way that Private Prosecutions are often defended, with the attack being on the process rather than the evidence, the Private Prosecutor is often in fact under greater scrutiny and the consequence is that the Private Prosecutor will ‘go the extra mile and ensure everything is in apple pie order’.
When asked about the issue of Prosecution Costs, she said:
“Because the CPS has to ‘do it on the cheap because of a lack of resources’… should not mean that private prosecutors are not entitled to recover a reasonable proportion of their costs.”
With private prosecutions often funded by companies or high-net-worth individuals, Rebecca also predicted that
“it will not be the big multinationals that are deterred by the costs cap. It will be smaller businesses, charities and individuals, who have already been let down by the state, which has denied them a public prosecution, who will be further let down as a private prosecution will not be open to them.”
Read full piece here: [Law Gazette]