Faced with a shortage of judges and record delays, the civil courts — which deal with hundreds of thousands of disputes between individuals and businesses — are in crisis, according to lawyers.
From January to March this year multi-track cases involving claims of more than £25,000 and fast-track claims involving between £10,000 and £25,000 took more than 18 months to reach trial, according to figures from the Ministry of Justice. That is more than six weeks longer than in 2022 and the longest period on record.
In the same three months small claims valued at less than £10,000 took an average of one year from the time of issue to trial. That was almost a week longer than the previous year and near the all-time high of 52.1 weeks in the third quarter of 2022.
Compared with the length of time taken for cases to come to trial in 2019 — before the coronavirus pandemic — the present figures are 21.4 weeks longer for multi and fast-track claims, and 14.9 weeks longer for small claims.
This is despite a 24 per cent fall in the annual number of claims being lodged, which fell from 2,029,258 in 2019 to 1,537,759 last year.
Ministry officials attribute the longer times to the increase in the volume of claims in the first quarter of the year — a rise that they say was driven in particular by money claims, and came despite an 8 per cent fall in personal injury cases.
Analysis of 7,500 cases by Express Solicitors on behalf of the Association of Consumer Support Organisations (ACSO) found that it took an average of 353 days for cases to get to trial. It revealed a “postcode lottery”, with a wide variance in delays, from 829 days in Dartford, Kent, to 79 days in Blackpool.
Delays were worst in the southeast and east of England, where cases took an average of 462 and 398 days, respectively, to get to trial, while courts in the northeast and Yorkshire heard cases in an average of 251 and 255 days.
The statistics echo the concerns of a report on court capacity and delays published last year by the cross-party justice committee, which called on the government to increase resources to deal with cases in a timely manner and set out the steps it was taking to reduce delays.
Matthew Maxwell Scott, the executive director of ACSO, says that the present figures represent “record highs”.
He adds: “What is deeply troubling is that there is no published strategy for dealing with this, no targets to hold ministers to account and no real sense this is being seen as the crisis it is.”
Lubna Shuja, president of the Law Society of England and Wales, says that the “unacceptable” delays in the civil courts are “a consequence of long-term underinvestment”, made worse by the pandemic.
Samuel Townend KC, vice-chairman of the Bar Council, cites a range of problems: insufficient judges, dilapidated buildings, a lack of administrative and support staff, and cuts to civil legal aid increasing the number of litigants in person and resulting in hearings taking longer.
Sir Geoffrey Vos, master of the rolls and head of civil justice, told MPs on the justice committee last week that civil justice was undervalued by society and often misunderstood. He accepted that the system was “by no means perfect” and said that there had been “very serious delays in some places”.
Vos argued, however, that the data was “slightly misleading” because it ignored the vast majority of cases that were resolved without judicial intervention, and which were being done more quickly.
The second most senior judge in the jurisdiction acknowledged that a shortage of district judges and experienced court staff, particularly in London and the southeast, had led to delays — especially because of the increase in urgent family law cases, which take priority over civil cases.
Vos told the MPs that he expected that measures to reduce the backlogs — including a pilot scheme that used judges from less busy areas to deal with hearings remotely and a “blitz of cases” using empty London courts during the vacation period, as well as measures to encourage mediation — would improve the system over the next few years.
He also anticipated that digitalisation would improve access to justice for those with civil law disputes. However, Vos suggested that there is a “discernible number of cases” where the parties did not want to come to court quickly, so that they and their lawyers have time to prepare. Vos stressed that there had been some success stories, including the online damages and civil money claims, which had tripled the speed between issue and directions and possession claims.
Maxwell Scott says that delayed justice means that claimants’ lives are put on hold. It also creates cash-flow problems for lawyers, who are struggling after the introduction of fixed fees, leaving many unable to take on cases, especially low-value complex matters.
The HM Courts and Tribunals Service told The Times that the number of cases being heard in the civil courts was at its highest
The agency said: “We are speeding up access to justice through the biggest-ever recruitment drive for district judges and by digitising more processes, while plans to increase the use of mediation will help more people resolve disputes without needing to go to court in the first place.”