April 2023 amendments to the Criminal Procedure Rules (England and Wales): pre-charge bail, electronic service, information requests, summary time limits, withdrawal of witness summonses, sexual harm prevention orders

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Practice notes

ARCHIVED: This Practice Note has been archived and is not maintained. It outlines the principal revisions to the Criminal Procedure Rules 2020 (CrimPR), SI 2020/759 introduced by the Criminal Procedure (Amendment) Rules 2023, SI 2023/44, effective from 3 April 2023. The amendments add provisions on pre-charge bail to reflect changes made by the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 (PCSCA 2022), and refresh rules on:

service of documents on court officers,
requests for information from the court about ongoing cases,
time limits for commencing proceedings,
applications to withdraw witness summonses.

Overall, the majority of changes aim to make the CrimPR simpler and clearer.

Pre-charge bail

CrimPR, SI 2020/759, rr 14.18 and 14.19 are revised to align with amendments to the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 (PACE 1984) made by the PCSCA 2022 concerning pre-charge bail, which commenced in October 2022. While the PCSCA 2022 did not substantially alter the core choices available to the police and other bodies when managing suspects under investigation, it did bring notable shifts: it removed the earlier presumption against pre-charge bail and conferred broader powers on investigators...

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Web page updated on 21/05/2026

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