A JUDGE has blasted the company which transports prisoners from custody to the court, after two days of severe delays.

Kathryn Llewellyn and Teresa Morgan-Peters are currently on trial at Swansea Crown Court following an alleged stabbing in Ystradgynlais on November 1 last year.

The jury, barristers, and court staff were told to be ready for a 10.30am start on Friday – a later start time to allow the defendants to be transported from HMP Eastwood Park in Gloucestershire to Swansea – while evidence would not be heard after 1.30pm due to a backlog of other cases which had been listed.

However, delays in transporting the defendants from prison meant that no evidence was heard.

This came after the trial was delayed by two hours the previous day, again due to prison transport delays.

A 10-year contract for prisoner escort and custody services, starting in August 2020, was awarded to Serco by the UK Government in October 2019.

Judge Geraint Walters said Serco “don’t care two hoots” about the delays.

“This is just wasting money as far as I am concerned,” he said. “At a cost of £10,000 a day.

“We do not even get an update. Don’t tell me there is no means of communication on board those vans.

“What did we get yesterday, half an hour before lunch? Today it would have been an hour before lunch.

“Quite frankly, if this happens on Monday, people in high places will be ordered to come to court.

“It is simply not good enough.

“I have been sitting as a judge in some capacity for 22 years and I have never had a delay caused by transport services two days in a row.”

Turning to the jury, he said: “I am sorry. Like you, I have just been sat looking outside the window. And it’s not fair on the defendants.

“It’s not good enough dragging you in for an hour’s work.

“We lost two hours of court time yesterday morning and it meant we couldn’t start a defendant because we were late. Today we lost an hour and a half.”

Serco’s website says it “provides safe and secure prisoner escort services on behalf of justice departments moving people quickly and efficiently between prisons or police stations and court appearances”.

A Serco spokesman said: “We always regret those infrequent occasions such as this when there are delays, but delivering prisoners to Swansea Crown Court from HMP Eastwood Park, near Wotton-under-Edge, which is the only female prison in the region, is typically a journey of over two hours and presents several significant logistical and administrative challenges.”

Llewellyn, 43, of Golwg y Mynydd in Godrergraig, and Morgan-Peters, 45, of Dolfain in Ystradgynlais, both deny charges of burglary, wounding with intent, and having a bladed article/knife in a public place.

Morgan-Peters denied a further charge of a bladed article/knife in a public place, but admitted unlawful wounding, which Llewellyn denies.