15th Amendment to the Criminal Practice Directions 2015 – October 2023
Amendments to the Criminal Practice Directions 2015 – October 2023
Summary of Key Changes
This is the fifteenth amendment to the Criminal Practice Directions 2015[1]. It was issued by the Lord Chief Justice and comes into force on 2nd October 2023.
The following retained paragraphs of the Criminal Procedure Rules 2015 are revoked in their entirety:
- CPD I 3Q Failure to comply with requirement to give name, date of birth and nationality
- CPD I 5C Issue of medical certificates
- CPD II 7A First court attendance after charge and detention,
- CPD III 14C.11 failure to surrender to bail: consequences and penalties
- CPD VI 24A Role of the justices’ clerk/legal advisor
- CPD VII J Bind over orders and conditional discharges
- CPD XI 48A Contempt in the face of the magistrates’ court
In 2020, the Lord Chief Justice appointed a judicial led working group to undertake a review and revision of the Practice Directions, to ensure they contained only the level of information that was necessary, in a style that made that information easy to find and understand. Those new Practice Directions came into force on 29th May 2023.
The above sections of the Criminal Practice Directions 2015 were temporarily retained, pending their incorporation into the 2020 Criminal Procedure Rules. The Criminal Procedure (Amendment No. 2) Rules 2023 incorporates those provisions and comes into force on 2nd October 2023. For that reason, at the same time, these sections of the 2015 Practice Direction will be revoked in their entirety, ensuring no unnecessary duplication.
Lord Burnett of Maldon
Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales
[1] 1 [2015] EWCA Crim 1567. Amendment Number 1 [2016] EWCA Crim 97 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 23rd March 2016 and came into force on the 4th April 2016. Amendment Number 2 [2016] EWCA Crim 1714 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 16th November 2016 and came into force on 16th November 2016. Amendment Number 3 [2017] EWCA Crim 30 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 31st January 2017 and came into force on 31st January 2017. Amendment Number 4 [2017] EWCA Crim 310 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 28th March 2017 and came into force on 3rd April 2017. Amendment Number 5 [2017] EWCA Crim 1076 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 27th July 2017 and came into force on 2nd October 2017. Amendment Number 6 [2018] EWCA Crim 516 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 21st March 2018 and came into force on 2nd April 2018. Amendment Number 7 [2018] EWCA Crim 1760 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 26th July 2018 and came into force on the 1st October 2018. Amendment Number 8 EWCA [2019] Crim 495 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 28th March 2019 and came into force on the 1st April 2019; Amendment Number 9 [2019] EWCA Crim 1603 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 10th October 2019 and comes into force on 14th October 2019; Amendment Number 10 EWCA [2020] Crim 604 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 12th May 2020 and came into force on the 13th May 2020; Amendment No 11 EWCA Crim 1347 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 29th October 2020 and came into force on Monday 16th November 2020; Amendment No 12 EWCA Crim 367 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 23rd March 2022 and came into force on Thursday 24th March 2022; Amendment No 13 [2022] EWCA Crim 688 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 25th May 2022; Amendment No 14 was issued by the Lord Chief Justice on 19th August 2022