By Jennifer Meierhans BBC News
- Published
The justice secretary must resign if he cannot reverse low conviction rates for rape within a year, Labour has said.
The shadow justice secretary accused Robert Buckland of shedding "crocodile tears" this week when he apologised for convictions falling to a record low.
David Lammy said: "If he cannot reverse these figures within a year of his apology, the justice secretary should do the honourable thing and resign."
The Conservatives said Mr Lammy was playing politics with a serious issue.
Earlier this week, Mr Buckland said he was "deeply ashamed" that convictions for rape and sexual offences in England and Wales had dropped to the lowest level since records began.
He admitted budget cuts were partly to blame and set out plans for a "system and culture change".
But Mr Lammy said: "The justice secretary's crocodile tears will mean nothing if the government fails to reverse its disastrous failure of rape victims.
"The Conservatives' decade of cuts to the justice system has let rapists and other violent criminals off the hook while denying victims justice."
The latest figures from the Crown Prosecution Service show there are an estimated 128,000 victims of rape and attempted rape a year. But only 1.6% of reported cases result in a charge.
A Tory spokesman said Mr Lammy's comments showed "naivety and a poor understanding of the criminal justice system to think that five years of decline can be reversed at the drop of a hat".
"We're focused on delivering justice for victims, not headlines for newspapers," he said.
The government has said it is considering allowing victims to pre-record their evidence to spare them the trauma of a courtroom trial.
Its review also outlined plans to focus more on the suspect's behaviour - not the accuser's, and make sure phones taken away for evidence-gathering were returned within a day.
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