News & Views

On 29th June we will be hosting the final event in our Justice for All series at The Old Bailey - Financing Justice. This will get to the heart of how the City of London and its community, especially its business community, can play a proactive role in supporting the society that we're part of.

 

The event will consider potential operational efficiencies and explore the role of finance in enabling justice, through social impact investment, technology adoption in law enforcement, and the creation of sustainable models for system reform. Within that, discussions will highlight innovative funding mechanisms to support both state and third-sector justice interventions.

 

This whole series has been focused on not only showing that it’s an ethical imperative to strive for better justice, but to underpin that mindset by proving the economic practicalities of a thriving judicial system that’s supported by the institutions around it. This final event will be attended by those representing social finance, law, public policy, philanthropy and experience across the criminal justice system, all brought together to generate innovative solutions for financing justice. 

 

We hope to provide some tangible examples of how the City’s business community can play its part. We all have an important role to play as individuals and organisations, and perhaps most importantly, by doing our bit we can help enable people far beyond the City walls to contribute to Justice for All as well.  

London’s standing as a global financial centre rests on the rule of law. The Justice for All series aligned with the 800th anniversary of Magna Carta and a decade on from the UN Sustainable Development Goals. However, SDG 16 - focusing on peace, justice and strong institutions - has regressed.

 

Justice requires a whole-system view: fairness and efficiency for the accused, in the light of imminent Leveson recommendations; meaningful support for victims and survivors, including in modern slavery and criminal supply chains; and rehabilitation for prison leavers.

 

When we did the research for the Justice for All series, one thing stood out to me, not because it’s particularly groundbreaking but because of its simple truth - justice in society is not the responsibility of any single person or entity, but of everyone. We all need to play our part in defining it, and upholding it for it to work. 

 

On a formal level, there are multiple institutions that share in its framework, including the police, CPS, courts, prisons, probation, legal aid, victim services, and more - all with different roles and accountabilities. However, there’s a whole world of complicity and action around that from individuals taking everyday actions, which also contributes to whether the system works or not. 

 

That might be something as basic as agreeing to abide by the laws or teaching our children right from wrong. It might also be where we choose to invest our money to support systems and organisations that uphold the agreed values we wish to live by and channel resources away from those that don't. As institutions we have a responsibility and an opportunity to enable individuals to make those choices. 

It's essential to recognise that justice makes economic sense for us all. A year of incarceration costs roughly the same as a year at a boarding school (£53,801 per prisoner per year as of February 2026), while reoffending is estimated to cost society £16.7 billion annually. 

 

That doesn't begin to consider the wider social and opportunity costs - from the material cost of the crime itself (a stolen iPhone), to the cost of tracking it down, bringing someone to justice, the cost of rehabilitating them, the cost of them not being in work during that period, the cost of a victim who might be unable to work as a result of trauma, and so forth. 

 

That money could otherwise be put to different economic use, and if you put those numbers into some sort of multiplier, it's a vast sum with an immense opportunity cost of not deploying that capital into productive activity. Then there's the reputational cost and loss of faith that permeates society.

There are lots of things that go into improving this picture, and throughout the course of this year I have had the enormous privilege of meeting people who prove one thing - there are solutions available to us if we can collectively take the time to listen to those in the know and act upon their advice. 

 

While it is not the entire solution, the City of London can contribute to those improvements. Throughout the Justice for All series we have detailed that opportunity in different areas, from recruitment ideas to practical steps towards due diligence in our supply chains - and I hope we have provided practical ideas rather than ideological ones alone.

 

A particular area of interest for me in my working life is the role of finance in the quest for improved justice. I have a profound belief in the importance of our financial institutions for serving the nation - remembering that it's the actions we take each day that influence the realities of peoples' lives - whether they enjoy a sense of financial safety in their retirement, or have what they need to support their children through school and university. 

 

Financial institutions have the opportunity to support justice and enable individuals to be a part of that social ecosystem through innovative solutions. For example, Green Gilts show that capital can be mobilised at scale with returns linked to impact. A justice equivalent could include justice infrastructure gilts or hybrid models drawing on social investment bond principles.

 

The challenge is to align public and private capital to deliver measurable outcomes, identify priority problem areas, target investment at root-cause solutions and move from ideas to demonstrable results. The Peterborough Social Impact Bond, which funded a rehabilitation programme for prisoners leaving HMP Peterborough (and evaluated by RAND Europe), offers early proof of concept.

 

Through these two models we can see inspiration for new public/private partnerships that can help finance justice.

On a personal note, my view is that for too long the debates around improving the justice space have felt they are solely about the fine points of law. 

 

While those are immensely important, until we illustrate the economic upside of justice for all we are going to struggle to make changes because the argument will always fall back on the idea that change is too expensive. What we are pointing out is that while improvement might have an upfront cost, the cost of not doing anything is much higher, and as a society it's not a bill we can afford to pay. 

 

Adam Smith's The Wealth of Nations promoted the notion that individual self-interest and operating in a free market can produce a cooperative social and economic order. Although in aggregate self-interest takes us to a better place, we have to work out why something makes economic sense to deal with it - why it appeals to society’s interests. 

 

Why justice for all makes economic sense has been the question we have sought to answer through this series, and I hope this final event provides positive innovation for how we can work together to have a positive impact. I would be delighted if you would join us.