WORCESTER MP Mike Foster has called for more magistrates from the city to serve in its courts.

The Labour MP says too many magistrates sitting on the bench in Worcester Magistrates Court, in Castle Street, do not live in the city itself.

Mr Foster has figures to show that only 34 out of 164 magistrates live in Worcester - one in five sitting on the bench.

He says because one in three people in the three districts of South Worcestershire live in the city, Worcester should provide at least another 20 magistrates.

The MP says he is concerned that magistrates who do not live in the city may not fully understand the problems faced by the victims of crime, especially now nearly half of all crime committed in South Worcestershire is in Worcester itself.

Mr Foster said: "Magistrates do a fine job. But it is important for the courts to be fully representative of local communities. I think there is still a job to do to find and recruit magistrates from the city of Worcester itself to make the South Worcestershire bench mirror better the local community. We have no problem supporting the need for a gender or ethnic balance for magistrates, and I would include community balance as well. There is not one magistrate from the whole of Warndon, Tolladine and Gorse Hill, for example."

Former city mayor Jo Hodges, who is both a Worcester city councillor for Warndon and a Worcestershire county councillor for Rainbow Hill, has also been a magistrate for the past 22 years.

Labour Coun Hodges, from Battenhall Rise, Battenhall, Worcester, who is also a former deputy leader of the city council, said local knowledge helped but was not essential when dispensing justice.

She added: "What I would say in support of what Mike Foster says is that local knowledge does help - but at the same time any magistrate will impartially make a judgement on crime and sentencing and you don't have to come from that area to make that judgement on someone. It does not interfere with the process of justice."