The Jury’s (Kind Of) Out

Newscast

BBC

Politics, News

4.4 • 6.4K Ratings

🗓️ 2 December 2025

⏱️ 39 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Today, David Lammy has confirmed plans to get rid of jury trials for crimes with sentences of less than three years.

The reforms to the justice system include creating "swift courts" under the government's plan to tackle unprecedented delays in the court system. Serious offences including murder, robbery and rape will still go before a jury. Lammy has said the reforms were “bold” but “necessary”. Adam is joined by home and legal correspondent Dominic Casciani.

And, amidst all the noise around last week’s budget you may have missed the Prime Ministers suggestion that he will accept all the recomendations made in a report that criticised the UK’s nuclear power industry as expensive and “overly complex”.

The man who wrote it, John Fingleton tells Adam about what he found and what he thinks it tells us about the UK’s approach to regulation.

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Get in touch with Newscast by emailing [email protected] or send us a WhatsApp on +44 0330 123 9480.

New episodes released every day. If you're in the UK, for more News and Current Affairs podcasts from the BBC, listen on BBC Sounds: https://bbc.in/4guXgXd Newscast brings you daily analysis of the latest political news stories from the BBC. The presenter was Adam Fleming. It was made by Jack Maclaren with Anna Harris and Shiler Mahmoudi. The social producer was Joe Wilkinson. The technical producer was Ricardo McCarthy. The assistant editor is Chris Gray. The senior news editor is Sam Bonham.

Transcript

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0:00.0	BBC Sounds, Music, radio, podcasts.
0:05.8	Hello, it's Adam from Newscast, messaging Newscast,
0:08.9	when are you going to do an interview with Katie Perry about her trip to space,
0:12.3	which was obviously one of the news highlights of the year question mark?
0:16.2	Would you like me to send this?
0:17.8	Yes.
0:19.9	Great, message send. That is me on Monday night, practicing what I'd
0:24.6	preached in the previous episode of Newscast and sending a comment to Newscast via my smart
0:30.3	speaker, although as predicted, mine does not do punctuation. And if you'd like to send us a comment
0:36.4	via your smart speaker, it's very easy.
0:39.2	Trigger your smart speaker. You know how to do that. I won't say it because it will cause all
0:42.8	sorts of consequences. And then you say, ask BBC sounds to send a comment to newscast. And then
0:50.7	your smart speaker will ask you what comment you want to send. And then, hey, presto, we will receive it and read every single one.
0:57.4	And let's see what comments are inspired by this latest episode of Newscast.
1:01.7	Newscast from the BBC.
1:04.0	Fat boy sliver me in the classroom doing our violin lessons.
1:07.0	I was the tattle tail in the class.
1:08.3	Can I have an apology, please?
1:09.6	I trust almost nobody. That daddy has to sometimes do strong language. Next time in Moscow. I feel delulu with no salulu. Take me down to Downey Street. Let's go have a tour. Blimey. Hello, it's Adam in the newscast studio. Later on, we're going to talk about a really interesting report into why nothing gets built in Britain and what it reveals about the country we all live in.
1:30.7	But first of all, today, David Lamy, the Deputy Prime Minister and Justice Secretary, unveiled reforms to trial by jury in England and Wales.
1:39.4	The short version is some trials that would have a jury now will in future, if these plans actually
1:47.0	are implemented, not have a jury, which has provoked big criticisms that this is a sort of sacrosanct
	...

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