Mahmood promises Labor will ‘restore the rule of law’

Labour’s Shabana Mahmood will promise to “restore the rule of law” if the party comes to power in her first speech as shadow justice secretary.

Ms Mahmood, a former lawyer, is about to launch a full-scale attack on the Conservatives’ record on the justice system, including the closure of courts in England and Wales, changes to legal aid and the backlog of criminal cases.

The shadow minister will also accuse successive Conservative Lord Chancellors of “failing in their historic duty” to defend the judiciary and the rule of law in a speech to legal professionals in London on Monday.

She will highlight the fines imposed on both Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak for breaching Covid rules, and criticize comments that ‘disparage’ judges and courts.

Ms Mahmood is expected to say she will “never allow any government I am part of to ignore the law or blame the judiciary for simply doing its job”.

Her speech comes as Liz Truss, herself a former Lord Chancellor, called for the abolition of the Supreme Court after it blocked the government’s Rwanda plan.

While she was justice secretary, Ms Truss was criticized for failing to condemn a Daily Mail front page that described judges as “enemies of the people” after ruling against the government in a Brexit case.

Ms Mahmood is also expected to focus on Labour’s pledge to halve violence against women and girls, promising to provide free legal advocacy for rape victims.

She will say: “Today the law treats rape victims as essentially no different from other witnesses, and thus fails to protect them when they are most needed.”

A Conservative Party spokesperson said Labor deputy leader Angela Rayner was the only person “on the front line of British politics who think they are above the law” and accused Sir Keir Starmer of being “too weak to to solve it.”

The spokesperson said: “Meanwhile, these promises are just more of the same old Labor party. Watching from the sidelines, the Labor Party has no plan to stop crime.

“It is under the leadership of the police and Labor Party crime commissioners that crime rates are higher in the areas. Labor voted against increases in police funding four years in a row. And it was Keir Starmer and his Labor MPs who campaigned to block the deportation of foreign murderers and criminals.”