Star comment: Smashing our courts is not justice

In the name of saving money and so-called efficiency, the network of on-the-doorstep courts has virtually disappeared.

Tough luck on the crooks, who now have to travel considerable distances to face the music. Serves 'em right, you may say.

The trouble with that way of thinking is, firstly, that forcing people to travel is not meant to be a punishment. Apart from anything else, those who find themselves in trouble with the law are innocent, until the judicial process finds them guilty, and some will in any event be cleared and remain innocent.

Then there are the witnesses, many of whom will actually be victims, whose co-operation and goodwill is vital to ensure the wheels of justice turn fairly.

If you think it is easy living in rural Shropshire and getting to and from Telford or Shrewsbury, try it yourself without a car. The car bit is significant because some before the courts for motoring offences will face being disqualified from driving.

Lastly, the people who attend court all year round are not the individuals accused of offences who, unless they are particularly prolific, make occasional visits, but the people who work at the courts – magistrates, solicitors, various other professionals and the staff.

Things in Shropshire are going from bad to worse. Small courts which were once in towns across the county have been closed in a remorseless process of centralisation at Shrewsbury and Telford. And now the magistrates court at Shrewsbury has been earmarked for closure by the Ministry of Justice.

Then there will be one magistrates court – at Telford. In the vanguard of opposition to this eventuality is a group with impeccable credentials.

They are honest men and women – Shropshire's magistrates. Their county chairman says locally and nationally access to justice is a major issue.

The closure of courts all over Shropshire without any regard for the Salopians who actually use them is a typical like-it-or-lump-it act of beancounters, who put money ahead of human convenience or even happiness.

Yet you have to question whether it really will save money. Ordinary Salopians will certainly not benefit. This historic smashing of Shropshire's court system is a retrograde step being imposed by outsiders whose view is: "They'll cope, somehow."