Starmer once called British justice system ‘two-tier’

The acting head of the Labour Party Sir Keir Starmer once discussed the topic of the so-called ‘two-tier justice’, stating that there was one model for the British ‘blessed with money’ people, and another one for everybody else. 
 
In July 2015, the Prime Minister writing in the Guardian endorsed that it was accurate on the part of Michael Gove, the Justice Secretary at the time, to argue that while courts are failing some, they are but providing a gold standard service to the wealthy. 
 
Last week, Sir Keir was labelled “two-tier Keir” by Elon Musk – the owner of X, formally of Twitter – when referring to the belief that Right-wing demonstrators are treated worse than their Left-wing counterparts in the wake of the UK unrests. 
 
The Prime Minister’s office in Downing Street denied these allegations and in parallel with that, the Metropolitan Police commissioner Sir Mark Rowley described them as “absolute nonsense”. 
 
Two months after he had became an MP, Sir Keir wrote: C Severin, Malia Bouattia, Baroness Deech, Michael Gove, the Lord Chancellor has stated that we now operate a dual justice system. One for the well-off segment of society and one for all the lesser mortals who cannot afford to be ‘indiscriminate’. 
 
“The worst let down, he said, was the victims and witnesses of crime and children who have been abandoned Gove is right, they are now universally recognised as having no access to justice. ” 
 
Speaking to BBC Radio Four’s The World Tonight, Sir Keir, who was director of public prosecutions between 2009 and 2013, said changes were “urgently needed” in order to modernise and reform criminal justice in Britain. He described reductions of £900m as “substantial” and said that the Conservatives had worsened the situation by introducing employment tribunal fees. 
 
“Improved exploitation of ICTs, reduction in the procedures, and enhancement in the time taken to produce the result are noble interventions that would be wellcomed” He further stated “However, increasing efficiency of our courts for the privileged few who undergo this system will not be of any help to the rest of the less privileged civilians that have been locked out of the system as they remain unprotected. ” 
 
“From initial brief interactions with victims in the course of my work as a director of public prosecution and later when I was leading victims’ task force for the Labour party, I well understand that there is a lot of demand from the victims of crime for much more than enhancing court processes. ” 
 
Writing in The Sunday Times, they are right to call for far more investment in far superior victims’ services, new legally guaranteed rights, and a change in the public’s attitude. 
 
Last year, in its Labour election manifesto, criminals were described as ‘getting away with murder,’ and the criminal justice system as ‘unequally and ineffec-tively protecting victims who often cannot get closure. ’ It pledged more frontline prosecutors and new roles for the victims’ commissioner, in addition to a tougher sentencing regime. 
 
Some Conservatives have complained that a ‘two-tier’ approach has emerged in terms of the authorities’ treatment of petrol-bomb wielding rioters and football sections in towns and cities across Britain in the past fortnight. 
 
Robert Jenrick, a contender for the Tory leadership, said he did not find Sir Keir as clear as he could be in admitting that some of the unrest witnessed on the streets of the UK had originated from ‘sectarian gangs’. 
 
Mr Musk’s intervention followed videos, including some of persons with their faces covered and waving Palestinian flags, some of them throwing projectiles at a pub in Birmingham. Cases captured on video or photos included a man repeatedly being kicked in the head by a rioter. 
 
In a series of posts on X, Mr Musk wrote: “Keir Starmer, why all communities are not protected in Britain? This is TwoTierKeir. Why two tiers?”