A "culture change" is needed among lawyers in England and Wales to stop them delaying criminal cases, says Home Office minister Lord Falconer.

His comments came as a scathing report into the criminal justice system found offenders are evading justice while millions of pounds are wasted.

Complexity and delay are built into the system

Lord Falconer

The Audit Commission has recommended lawyers be paid based on how swiftly cases are dealt with.

The government's financial watchdog found court delays cost taxpayers �80m a year.

Lord Falconer, a lawyer himself, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that the whole system needed to be overhauled.

"The report shows that there are a large number of people who feel that the system lets them down," he said.

The minister, who has responsibility for criminal justice, said the present system encouraged delays.

Guilty pleas

"If the longer it [the case ] goes on the more chance that the defendant slips through the crack, the motive for lawyers is to stretch the process out".

He said a system where "complexity and delay" were built in needed to be changed to encourage defendants to make early guilty pleas.

"That is the culture of the criminal justice system," he said.

"You have got to change it to one where speed, not in any way compromising fairness, is important."

The Audit Commission report said the wastage - enough to pay for an extra 3,800 police officers - is squandered by "delays and inefficiencies throughout the system".

The report identified the reasons for the inefficiencies.

• Police charge suspects with the wrong offence and then the error has to be corrected by the Crown Prosecution Service

• Vital information held on the police national computer is often out of date

• Trials are held up by delays in the forensic science service providing evidence

• The current fee structure encourages lawyers to prolong cases to boost their fees.

The report called for radical change in the culture of courts where lawyers would be rewarded for dealing with cases quickly.

It suggests they are fined if found to be stalling to increase their own fees.

Inefficiencies are leading to a gap between the number of crimes reported (5.2 million in 2000-2001) and the number of offenders sentenced (326,000), the report found.

Controller of the Audit Commission, Sir Andrew Foster, said: "We have certainly found a system that does not work together as a system."

He said that resolving issues of inefficiency in the criminal justice system by "integrated management" at a local level was vital to ensuring that justice is delivered.

The prime minister's official spokesman said there was broad agreement that the system needed to be speeded up and bottlenecks tackled.

"Of course the government takes responsibility for ensuring that the right measures are put in place".

Checks and balances

But Janet Paraskeva, chief executive of the Law Society which represents 80,000 solicitors, told Today that the Audit Commission's conclusions were "simply not right".

"The report shows no evidence whatsoever that lawyers are stringing out cases in this way," she said.

She added that the fee structure for defence lawyers disallowed such delays.

And a Bar Council spokesman said the "checks and balances" on lawyers were already in place.

"Judges have full powers to penalise lawyers who unnecessarily drag out cases and we would urge them to use them".

A White Paper with proposals on courts and sentencing is due to be published in the next few weeks.