EPPING Magistrates Court is the least used courthouse in the county, acording to the Essex Magistrates Court Committee, which wants to close it.o

Epping Forest Council has yet to submit its comments, and it was waiting until Tuesday the deadline for the call-in period before inviting the bench chairman, police divisional commander Superintendent Ian Learmonth and the magistrates court committee chairman to explain the plans.

Executive committee chairman Andrew Thompson fears inconvenient journeys for court users, and he is concerned about the quality of justice under the proposed changes, which could see a rebuilt or refurbished court in Harlow.

The court committee wrote to all district councils in July setting out proposals for a £30m private finance initiative project to provide state-of-the-art magistrates' courts for the county.

But the district council said the letter went astray in the post and was never received, and it was not until the magistrates court committee issued a press release in September that the move came to light.

Courts committee chairman Celia Edey said: "If Epping Forest Council has concerns, we would like to hear about them.

"We have met many council leaders and MPs since we wrote in July and the council would be welcome to come and discuss any issues with the committee."

She added: "We cannot talk about Epping courthouse in isolation because it is a part of joint court facilities serving Epping Forest, Harlow and Uttlesford districts. The rest of the facilities are in Harlow and, for example, all trials for the three districts are held in Epping, which means that all witnesses travel to Epping, although the majority of offences come from Harlow.

"The district council appears to be concerned about an increase in travelling for defendants and witnesses but, in fact, if our proposals were carried into effect, there would, overall, be less travelling rather than more.

"Less than a quarter of those who come to Epping court at present actually live in the Epping Forest district. The numbers coming to the courthouse are in any case small, since it is the least used courthouse in Essex.

"It has been our policy since 1990 that because it is so unfit for the present age, Epping courthouse should be closed as soon as the opportunity arose to provide users with a modern courthousewhere they could instead.

"This is the first chance we have had to provide just such a modern courthouse.

"This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to provide all those coming to court in Essex with all the modern, specialist facilities they require, and which we can never provide in a pre-war courthouse like Epping.

"We cannot miss this opportunity to provide proper facilities for everyone, including those in the Epping Forest district."

November 22, 2001 8:46