MPs have criticised plans by the public prosecution service to deal with more cases out of court by imposing non-custodial sentences for offences such as threats and minor assaults.

Chief prosecutor Rinus Otte has said around 80% of all cases could be dealt with without a judge to relieve pressure on the system and the prison service.

Prosecutors can issue fines and community service penalties, but have no power to send offenders to prison. Otte, the chair of the college of attorneys-general, has said he favours alternative punishments for crimes that carried a prison sentence of less than six years, including some violent offences.

But in a debate with justice minister David van Weel, MPs were critical of the measure and called for the prosecution service’s powers to be limited.

Emiel van Dijk, justice spokesman for the far-right PVV, said it would lead to a “downward spiral with fewer and fewer prosecutions and increasingly light sentences.”

The centre-right NSC party proposed reining in the prosecution service’s powers to issue direct penalties so all offences that carried a potential sentence of at least four year, rather than six, would have to go before a judge.

Van Weel warned that some 5,500 cases that were dealt with by prosecutors would have been added to the waiting list in 2023 if the rule had been in force then.

Other MPs called for the plans to be put on hold until the impact of the latest change in the rules, which allows thefts and other crimes against property to be dealt with out of court, has been assessed. Prosecutors have been able to handle these cases directly since February.

Van Weel was supported by his own VVD party, who said it would reduce the number of cases delayed because the courts have no capacity to hear them.

“It’s not a question of jail rather than dealing with the case out of court,” said VVD MP Ingrid Michon. “It’s between an out-of-court penalty and none.”