Are you free on 9 March 2026?
You might be a traumatised victim of crime, you may be the suspect accused of wrongdoing, either way you’ll be waiting for the next 460 days… and probably beyond.
That’s exactly what we have just seen inside Leicester Crown Court. Not just once, but case after case shunted into 2026.
The judge in court four isn’t doing it by choice but necessity.
“It is sad because it happened a very long time ago,” he says of the next case, as he consigns everyone involved in an already long-running saga to a further two-year wait.
The judge then turns to us, two Sky News journalists sat making notes on his rather mundane case.
“Can I ask why you are here?” he asks directly.
We’d been told the delays in crown courts across the country are becoming intolerable and the system is breaking down – causing enormous stress, anger and dismay to all concerned.
Leicester Crown Court
The judge then takes the unusual step of addressing the crisis to us in open court.
“I have cases day in, day out that I am having put over. It can be years, if you lose a date in 2025 it is 2026.
“All these cases you have to decide who gets priority… fraud cases are being put on the back burner. In my position I have cases put over for months, even years.”
As a rule, judges don’t do interviews, so this is as close as we’ll get to hearing what he thinks.
He is clearly exasperated and remarkably candid: “I don’t know where things are going to go but they aren’t going to get any better,” he says.
It is a small audience – two court administrators, two barristers, a defendant and two Sky News journalists – but the judge has had enough of this incredibly slow justice.
He is asking victims, defendants, families on both sides, witnesses, the police, court staff, barristers and solicitors to just keep waiting. Every week the backlog gets bigger.
‘Broken’ system
Leading barrister Mary Prior KC is sad at the crumbling system she navigates every day.
“People are still having trials. People are still having their cases heard. It’s the speed that that’s happening…
“I don’t like saying it’s broken,” she says. “But it is broken because it’s not effective. It’s not functioning in the way it used to function.”
She is the chair of the Criminal Bar Association which represents 3,600 barristers – many of them now exasperated by the gridlock.
“There’s this old saying, isn’t there? Justice delayed is justice denied.
“It’s incredibly difficult to have to look people in the eye and say ‘I’m sorry your trial is going to be adjourned until 2025, 26, 27 and now 2028’,” Ms Prior KC adds.
Chair of the Criminal Bar Association Mary Prior KC
Between cases, a defence barrister in court four leant backwards to us in the public gallery after the judge’s monologue and said: “Well, what do you expect if you close so many courtrooms?”
Every day around 15% to 20% of court rooms remain idle in England and Wales – cases can’t proceed if there are not enough judges or barristers to run them – but that’s one part of a multi-faceted problem.
The police are charging more people who then need to go to court and on the other side the prisons are backing up and releasing inmates early.
Read more from Sky News:
‘Justice system is letting us down’
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Some barristers have had enough and are moving away from criminal law to work in less chaotic areas of the legal profession.
As we walk to the next court we pass a trolley used to shift paperwork around which has been shoved under some stairs. There’s a handwritten sign taped to it reading “DO NOT USE – BROKEN TROLLEY.” It feels symbolic.
Another KC explains to us in the corridor that the nationwide computer system they use for tracking cases and finding the details they need has gone down again. For a few hours, it’s making it impossible for him and his colleagues to effectively represent people.
To cap it off, the prison van for his murder case is two hours late. Again. The two teenagers he is prosecuting for murder arrived just before lunchtime – it happens most days.
The KC is waiting, the judge is waiting, the twelve members of the jury are waiting, the accused teenagers are waiting – the victim’s family is waiting. It’s them who must be suffering the most.
‘The whole system is f***ed!’
We were invited into the barrister’s robing room – which you might think would be quite a grand serene space – it isn’t.
There’s an electrician trying to fix another fault in a box on the wall.
The shared wood topped desk is full of barristers looking harassed with laptops open, their wigs sat next to them – most don’t have the preparation time they need for their next case.
It’s mid-afternoon when a stressed court clerk rushes in.
“I need someone to defend and someone to prosecute right away,” she says apologetically.
The case should have already started but it can’t without barristers to represent both sides. The chaos means there’s no point working out why nobody has turned up, it just happens.
Annabelle Lenton, a young barrister, rolls her eyes, sighs and volunteers.
“I’ve got no idea what is going on today,” she tells us exasperated at having to pick up another case with no time to look at it beforehand.
After the chaos she tells us why it matters to her they keep going.
“If you think about it, if we don’t have a functioning criminal justice system, we are in a position where you have people roaming the streets who are committing serious offences and there’s no retribution for that.
“People aren’t getting justice quick enough and if they’re not… what’s the point in any of it? People will start to give up.”
It’s also one of the reasons why significant numbers of young barristers are moving away from criminal work to other less stressful areas of law.
“It’s f***ing s**t. The whole system is f***ed!”
‘Like the wild west’
Understandably the straight-talking prosecutor we meet next doesn’t want us to use his name but he invites us into one of the tiny and tatty consultation rooms.
“People are now getting away with crimes because of the delays – cases that never actually go ahead because people pull out or there’s nobody to take them. I’d say that’s happening most weeks now.”
He prosecutes big cases in crown courts in the Midlands and the southeast of England.
“It’s bad here in Leicester, Snaresbrook (east London) is like the wild west – biggest court house in Europe with twenty courts, some of them are always empty and the delays are ridiculous.”
In Leicester they even have a ghost court – it’s called courtroom 99. It doesn’t exist – it’s just somewhere to move the cases that won’t get heard on the day they were supposed to.
It leaves victims of crime cast adrift and questioning whether or not to pursue their case.
The chief executive of the charity Victim Support, Katie Kempen, said: “The anxiety, the pressure, the despair, the long waits actually become unbearable for victims, especially when their court date keeps moving, keeps being lost.
chief executive of Victim Support Katie Kempen
“They really prepare themselves… if they find that the case is then adjourned on the day we see real acute distress and despair, sometimes we find that victims just can’t go on and so their opportunity for justice is lost.
“When they can’t actually get that day in court and they can’t actually see justice done for the wrong they’ve been a victim of, it is just absolutely devastating.”
As we leave down the newly gritted steps of the court building in Leicester another man who works for the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) stops to chat – also intrigued by our presence.
“It’ll take years to fix,” he says gloomily. “Actually probably a decade.”
A grief-stricken family has told Sky News they want “someone to take accountability” for the death of Lewis Stone, a retired butcher who was killed by a secure psychiatric unit patient released 10 days earlier.
In her first TV interview, Mr Stone’s step-daughter Vicki Lindsay said they were calling for an internal NHS Trust report to be made public so that lessons can be learned.
“The thought of anybody going through what we’ve gone through for the last six years… We’re living a life sentence,” she said.
On 28 February 2019, Lewis Stone was where he loved being most – the remote town of Borth on the west coast of Wales near Aberystwyth. It’s where he and his wife, Elizabeth, had a holiday home and planned to retire.
Lewis’s step-daughter, Vicki Lindsay, says the family wants an apology and accountability
That morning, Lewis left for his daily pre-breakfast walk with his beloved dog Jock along the River Leri and never came home.
He had been stabbed multiple times, and despite repeated attempts to save his life, he died in hospital three months later.
Lewis’s killer, David Fleet, was sectioned under the Mental Health Act after admitting manslaughter with diminished responsibility.
Sentencing, Judge Paul Thomas QC said Lewis had been in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Lewis’s family disagrees: “I just want somebody to say, ‘Yes, we messed up, we’re sorry. It doesn’t change things but we’re sorry’.
“We’ve had none of that. Mum’s had nothing, no support, she’s had nothing. That’s all we want, an admission.”
Elizabeth and Lewis Stone, with their step-daughter Vicki Lindsay (centre), in happier times
Lewis Stone and his grand-daughter Sammy
Fleet was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia at the time of the attack and told psychiatrists if he had not stabbed Mr Stone, the voices in his head “were going to kill him”.
Four months earlier, he had been detained under the Mental Health Act, but despite concerns raised by his own family, it was decided he should be treated at home.
The Hywel Dda health board told Sky News they don’t intend to release the internal report into Fleet’s care.
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Sharon Daniel, the Interim Executive Director for Nursing, Quality and Patient Experience, said: “The Duty of Candour for patients came into force in Wales in April 2023. At the time of this incident and concern, we fulfilled our duties to be open.”
When asked if they would be willing to apologise to both affected families, Ms Daniel said: “In the event of serious incidents, we have robust processes in place for reviewing internally, identifying any issues, and where appropriate preparing an improvement plan to prevent such an occurrence in the future. We regret such incidents and always seek to learn from them.”
In February, victims’ families in Nottingham won their fight for an NHS review into the care of paranoid schizophrenic Valdo Calocane, who killed three people, to be made public. It exposed a catalogue of errors and systemic failings.
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In February, Sky’s Sarah-Jane Mee spoke to two mothers of two people killed by paranoid schizophrenic Valdo Calocane
The family’s adviser and former NHS lawyer Radd Seiger, who also advised the Nottingham families, told Sky News the two cases have striking similarities: “Sunlight is the best disinfectant when there are problems in the NHS.
“Let’s have these things out in the open. Yes, they’re uncomfortable, but that’s the only way the NHS is going to learn from its mistakes.
“It’s no good them marking their own homework in private where journalists, or lawyers, or families don’t get to scrutinise these things because we see that these things keep happening over and over and over.”
David Fleet’s family declined an opportunity to speak to Sky News for this report.
The Welsh government said: “We are fully committed to openness and transparency in line with the Duty of Candour to ensure lessons are learned. We have also invested in improving both the quality and safety of mental health care in Wales.”
A host of local and mayoral elections will be taking place across England on Thursday 1 May – the first voting day since the general election last year.
There will also be a new Member of Parliament.
Here is everything you need to know – from what’s at stake to how you can vote.
Local elections
There will be local elections in 23 of England’s 317 local authorities on 1 May.
Some are slightly different to others, depending on the type of authority.
Here is the full list:
County councils
• Cambridgeshire
• Derbyshire
• Devon
• Gloucestershire
• Hertfordshire
• Kent
• Lancashire
• Leicestershire
• Lincolnshire
• Nottinghamshire
• Oxfordshire
• Staffordshire
• Warwickshire
• Worcestershire
Unitary authorities
• Buckinghamshire
• Cornwall
• County Durham
• North Northamptonshire
• Northumberland
• Shropshire
• West Northamptonshire
• Wiltshire
Metropolitan district
• Doncaster
The Isles of Scilly, which has a unique governance structure, is also holding a local election of its own.
Additionally, about 1,270 parish councils will be holding elections.
What is the difference between the types of authorities?
A county council is part of a two-tier local government system, taking care of things that affect the whole county, such as:
• Education
• Transport
• Planning
• Fire and public safety
• Social care
• Libraries
• Waste management
• Trading standards
They work alongside the other, lower-tier councils – district, borough or city – that take care of things on a smaller scale, such as:
• Rubbish collection
• Recycling
• Council tax collections
• Housing
• Planning applications
A unitary authority is a one-tier local government, where the services of a county council and the other smaller councils listed above are combined.
A metropolitan district has a council that oversees all services, similar to a unitary authority – but has a mayor with a role similar to that of local councils.
The mayors for Doncaster and North Tyneside are single authority, making them the political leader of the council and leaving them responsible for delivering local council services.
Metro mayors chair combined authorities made up of several local councils.
Metro mayor election
There are six mayoral elections taking place on 1 May, two of which are the first ever in their areas.
One of them is for the West of England, where the current mayor is Dan Norris, who was elected as a Labour MP when he defeated Jacob Rees-Mogg to win the seat of North East Somerset and Hanham in last year’s general election.
Labour MP Dan Norris. File pic: PA
Mr Norris, who has been mayor since 2021, has to vacate the role because the Labour Party introduced rules to prevent serving MPs from standing as mayoral candidates.
There is another mayoral election in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, while the first mayors for Hull and East Yorkshire and Greater Lincolnshire will be chosen after devolution deals were agreed in 2023, bringing together local councils in both areas to create larger authorities.
There will also be elections for the next mayor of Doncaster and North Tyneside.
New MP for Runcorn and Helsby
A by-election is also being held in Runcorn and Helsby after Labour’s Mike Amesbury agreed to stand down following his conviction for punching a man in the street.
Amesbury, who was suspended from the Labour Party, was jailed on 24 February for 10 weeks after he pleaded guilty to assault by beating of 45-year-old Paul Fellows in Main Street, Frodsham, Cheshire, in the early hours of 26 October.
However, following an appeal, his sentence was suspended for two years.
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Amesbury steps down as MP
His resignation means Karen Shore, the deputy leader of Cheshire West and Chester Council, will run for Labour in the by-election, while the Conservatives are putting forward Sean Houlston, a membership services manager for the National Federation of Builders, and Sarah Pochin, a former Cheshire East councillor, is Reform’s candidate.
Amesbury came first in Runcorn and Helsby with 22,358 votes at the 2024 general election – equating to 52.9% of the electorate.
Reform UK came in second with 7,662 votes (18.1%) and the Tories in third with 6,756 votes (16%).
Outcomes could have significant national impact
The elections will be the first big test of all the parties since the general election, which fundamentally redrew the UK’s political landscape with a new world of multiparty politics.
The Tories have the most to lose as they hold 20 of the 23 local authorities up for grabs on 1 May.
And for the first time in a long time, Labour and the Conservatives are facing a genuine threat from other parties.
YouGov conducted exclusive polling for Sky News to get a sense of how the country was feeling ahead of the elections, surveying 2,178 adults in the UK on 6 and 7 April.
Here is the voting intention poll:
• Labour: 24% (no change)
• Reform UK: 23% (no change)
• Conservatives: 22% (+1)
• Liberal Democrats: 17% (+3)
• Green Party: 9% (-2)
It suggests that Nigel Farage’s Reform UK could be Labour’s closest competitor, with Kemi Badenoch trailing as she leads the Conservatives through elections for the first time, while the Lib Dems have closed the gap on the three top parties.
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How do I register to vote?
You have until 11.59pm on Friday to register to vote if you haven’t already.
You must be aged 16 or over (or 14 or over in Scotland and Wales) to register to vote – but to vote for a new MP you must be at least 18.
You can register if you are:
• A British citizen
• An Irish or EU citizen living in the UK
• A Commonwealth citizen who has permission to enter or stay in the UK, or who does not need permission
• A citizen of another country living in Scotland or Wales who has permission to enter or stay in the UK, or who does not need permission
• You can be an overseas voter if you previously lived in the UK and are a British citizen.
The easiest and quickest way to register is online.
Alternatively, you can use a paper form – though it may be too close to the deadline for you to complete this by the deadline.
You can do it by contacting your local Electoral Registration Office and asking them to post a form to you. Or you can print your own form off. You’ll then need to return the completed form to your local Electoral Registration Office.
How can I cast my vote?
There are three ways to vote:
In person at your local polling station
You’ll be sent a poll card just before an election or referendum telling you when to vote and at which polling station. It will usually be in a public building, such as a school or local hall, near your home.
You can only vote at the polling station allocated to your address. This will be shown on your poll card. You can also enter your postcode on this website to find out where your polling station is.
You will be able to cast your vote any time between 7am and 10pm
You must bring a form of photo ID with you in order to vote. There are 22 accepted types of ID.
At the polling station, you will need to give your name and address to staff and show them your photo ID.
There will be instructions in the polling booth telling you exactly how to cast your vote.
Postal vote
You can register to vote by post for any reason, including that you simply don’t want to go to a polling station on the day.
You need to apply for this by 5pm on 14 April and can do so by clicking here.
Postal votes now expire every three years, so if you registered to do so more than three years ago, you will need to re-apply.
By proxy
This is where you apply for someone to vote on your behalf if you cannot go to the polling station in person and do not want to or can’t vote by post.
You and your proxy must both be registered to vote in the UK before you can apply.
The deadline to apply for proxy voting in the May 1 elections is 5pm on 23 April, and you can apply here.
Which elections have been postponed – and why?
Elections for county councils in the following areas have been postponed until May 2026:
• Norfolk
• Suffolk
• Essex
• Thurrock
• Surrey
• East and West Sussex
• Hampshire
• Isle of Wight
Most areas of the UK are now covered by one-tier systems such as unitary authorities, but there are still 21 county councils.
The government is pushing for a “devolution revolution”, meaning the remaining county councils are being encouraged to merge with other local authorities to become unitary authorities.
So in December last year, the government told county councils they could request to postpone their elections set for 1 May if they were trying to reorganise into one-tier systems.
While 16 county councils requested to postpone, only the eight listed above were successful.
A new spit test for prostate cancer which can be done at home may be better than current testing methods, a study suggests.
Experts have developed a simple saliva test which analyses genetic variants in a man’s DNA, which appears to perform better than the current method for assessing prostate cancer risk.
Currently, the prostate-specific antigen (PSA) blood test is used to check for prostate conditions, including prostate cancer or an enlarged prostate.
Routine testing is not currently available on the NHS, but patients may be offered a PSA test if a GP suspects they have prostate cancer. Men over 50 can ask their GP for a PSA test even if they do not have symptoms.
But experts have said the new saliva test could be used as an additional screening tool, as it reduced the number of false positive results and detected a higher proportion of aggressive cancers than the PSA test.
It could lead to fewer men being sent for unnecessary testing, according to researchers at The Institute of Cancer Research, London, and The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust.
They tested the effectiveness of a new tool they had developed called a polygenic risk score, which uses spit to assess 130 genetic variants known to be associated with an increased risk of prostate cancer, which can then determine whether or not a person is at high risk of the disease.
The new spit test for prostate cancer. Pic: PA
Test saved lives of two brothers
Taking part in the trial saved the lives of two brothers.
Dheeresh Turnbull said traditional methods to assess prostate cancer deemed he had a low risk of disease, but the new spit test helped the 71-year-old discover he actually had a life-threatening tumour in his prostate.
After finding out the news, his brother Joel Turnbull also took part in the study and discovered he had an aggressive prostate tumour.
“It’s incredible to think that because of this study two lives have now been saved in my family,” Dheeresh said.
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How the tool was assessed
The brothers were among 6,300 men aged 55 to 69 in the UK who were assessed by the tool as part of the study.
Of those, 745 (12%) were deemed to have a high risk score and were invited to have prostate cancer screening, including an MRI scan and a biopsy.
Prostate cancer was detected in 187 of the 468 who took up the offer, and of those, 103 had cancer that was deemed to be “higher risk”, so treatment was offered.
Of the 187 men, 118 had a PSA level below 3.0ug/L – which is considered “normal” and would typically indicate no further screening is required.
Test could ‘turn the tide on prostate cancer’
Writing in the New England Journal of Medicine, the researchers said cancer “would not have been detected” in 74 of the men using the “diagnostics pathway” currently in use in the UK – which includes a high PSA level and an MRI.
They concluded that for the men with the highest genetic risk, the test falsely identified fewer people with prostate cancer than the PSA test and picked up people with cancer who would have been missed by the PSA test alone.
It detected a higher proportion of aggressive cancers than the PSA test and also accurately identified men with prostate cancer who were missed by an MRI scan.
Professor Ros Eeles, from the Institute of Cancer Research, London, and The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, said: “With this test, it could be possible to turn the tide on prostate cancer.
“We have shown that a relatively simple, inexpensive spit test to identify men of European heritage at higher risk due to their genetic make-up is an effective tool to catch prostate cancer early.
Some 55,000 cases of prostate cancer are diagnosed each year in the UK, with around 12,000 men in the UK dying from the disease annually, according to Cancer Research UK.
It comes after Health Secretary Wes Streeting suggested he would support a national prostate cancer screening programme for men at higher risk of disease if it is backed by the evidence. The UK’s National Screening Committee is currently assessing whether or not such a programme should be rolled out.
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