The Law Society: Research into Public Attitudes Towards Criminal Justice
Background & Context
The Law Society commissioned M·E·L Research to undertake research into public attitudes towards the criminal justice system in England and Wales. The aim was to provide robust, nationally representative evidence about how the public viewed the criminal justice system and a range of issues relating to its operation, funding and potential reform.
The research covered several important and potentially sensitive areas. These included public confidence in the criminal justice system; perceptions of its importance as a public service; attitudes towards government spending and investment priorities; and views about equality, fairness and access to justice. The study also explored attitudes towards publicly funded legal representation for people who could not afford a lawyer.
Another important element concerned jury trials and potential court reforms. The Law Society wanted to understand people’s underlying views about the use of jury trials, as well as their response to a specific proposal under which many cases carrying prison sentences of less than three years would be decided by a judge alone rather than a jury.
The research also examined attitudes towards investment in the criminal justice system and explored whether providing additional contextual information about spending affected people’s views. Finally, it investigated people’s experience of jury service and whether serving on a jury had affected their confidence in the jury system.
Approach
M·E·L Research designed and delivered a large-scale quantitative study among the public in England and Wales.
Nationally representative public survey: We surveyed 2,000 consumers across England and Wales, providing a substantial quantitative evidence base. The questionnaire explored confidence in the criminal justice system; perceptions of its importance; views on government spending and spending priorities; equality and fairness; publicly funded legal representation; jury trials and proposed court reforms; and experience of jury service.
Structured questionnaire design: The questionnaire incorporated agreement scales, single-response questions and a spending-priority exercise in which respondents could select up to three priorities. Appropriate questions and response options were randomised to minimise potential ordering effects.
Careful sequencing of policy questions: The questionnaire was deliberately structured to capture respondents’ existing opinions before providing additional information that could influence their answers. For example, respondents were first asked for their general view about court trials before being given information about proposed government reforms and asked whether they supported or opposed them.
Testing the impact of contextual information: We incorporated an experimental-style element into the questionnaire to understand whether additional information affected attitudes towards investment. Respondents first gave their views about government spending on criminal justice. Later in the survey, they were presented with contextual information comparing per-person spending at two points in time, including an explanation of the impact of inflation. They were then asked whether this information changed their view towards increased government investment. The contextual information was deliberately positioned towards the end of the questionnaire to prevent it influencing responses to earlier questions.
Exploration of jury experience: All respondents were asked whether they had previously served on a jury in England or Wales. 419 respondents had experience of jury service and were asked an additional question about whether the experience had changed their confidence in the jury system. This provided a sufficiently substantial subgroup for analysis of the views of people with direct experience of jury service.
Analysis and Outputs
M·E·L Research analysed the quantitative survey data at both an overall and subgroup level. The analysis examined differences according to characteristics including age, sex, socio-economic group and ethnicity, as well as comparing respondents who had and had not previously served on a jury.
Statistical significance testing was used when examining subgroup differences. This enabled the reporting to identify where differences between groups were statistically significant rather than simply reflecting variation within the sample.
We produced a comprehensive written research report for the Law Society. This presented the findings thematically, supported by clear charts showing the distribution of responses to each of the principal survey questions. Commentary alongside the charts explained patterns within the data and highlighted relevant statistically significant differences between demographic and experiential groups.
The report was structured around the Law Society’s principal areas of interest, covering attitudes towards criminal justice; spending levels and allocation; legal representation and trials; investment; and jury service. It concluded with an overall synthesis of the evidence and included the full questionnaire as an appendix, providing transparency around the measures, response scales, routing and question wording used in the research.
The resulting study provided the Law Society with a robust, nationally representative quantitative evidence base through which to understand public attitudes across a range of criminal justice issues. The outputs brought together overall public opinion, subgroup analysis and responses to carefully sequenced policy and contextual information in an accessible format for the client.
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