Economic Recovery Could Come At A Deadly Price

The new austerity measures announced by the coalition government could place the lives of thousands of people in jeopardy. Proposed cuts to forensic science could result in miscarriages of justice and a complete lack of faith in an already faltering judiciary. The Forensic Science Service has warned that such ‘penny-pinching’ measures will not do the criminal justice any good.

This is not all that is at risk, as Great Britain has always been known as the leader in developing crime related technologies. This will not remain to be the case if the fixation on prices and spending cuts proceed, according to Dr. Simon Bennett.

Dr. Bennett remarked, “We need to recognise that forensic science is a frontline service not a back office function. In-sourcing by police, pressures on prices, public sector cuts and the absence of a mechanism to reward innovation – these things have the potential to throttle the independent provision of forensic science.”

Dr Bennett is the chief executive of the Forensic Science Service, and was in charge of supervising a reduction in its size in order to create a market more conducive to competition. However Dr Bennett was shocked at the state of the sector, which was created artificially by the last government. The most disturbing aspect has been the transformation made by the customer (i.e. the police) into ‘competitors’.

This move towards in-house forensics is the opposite of a trend set about in the 90’s. In the 90’s, such lab’s fell into disrepute when it was discovered that innocent people has been set to prison in the cases of the Guildford Four, the Birmingham Six and Judith Ward. Dr Bennett emphasised that the separation between forensics and the police was deliberate and “for a very good reason”.

The Chief Constable of the West Midlands, Chris Sims, had to disagree.

“The police service has a long history of direct involvement in forensic science, from the development of fingerprint identification to recent advances in ballistics, and that work is done to high standards and independently verified. It remains, however, a tiny part of the forensic science sector,” he said.

“The reality is that after a period of rapid growth due to the expansion of DNA, the forensic science market is shrinking and that is a difficult situation for the FSS and other providers. A key factor in the decline in the market is that crime has fallen … and that means there is less work for forensic scientists to do.