Source · Select Committees · Justice Committee
Recommendation 9
9
Accepted
Urgent need for collaboration on judge recruitment and competitive HMCTS staff pay.
Conclusion
The Government, the Judiciary and the Judicial Appointments Commission should work closely together to address the challenges in recruiting judges in those areas where there is the greatest need for increased capacity. In relation to the pay of HMCTS staff, the Government needs to ensure that pay levels keep up with those for equivalent roles in other departments. (Paragraph 29) Evaluating court capacity
Government Response Summary
The government committed to expanding judicial recruitment, increasing maximum sitting days for crime Recorders from 30 to 80 days, and legislating to raise the judicial mandatory retirement age from 70 to 75, as part of efforts to increase court capacity and reduce the Crown Court backlog.
Government Response
Accepted
HM Government
Accepted
Our plans for Crown Court recovery this year are based on running the system at the maximum possible level, given the constraints of physical and judicial capacity. Future years are subject to Spending Reviews and subsequent Concordat process. We have removed the limit on Crown Court sitting days in 2022/23, ensuring there is no funding constraint on Crown Court recovery. Over 60 Crown courtrooms previously unavailable due to the pandemic have been reopened and 22 Nightingale Crown courtrooms have been extended beyond March 2022. This means around 500 Crown courtrooms are now available for hearings and trials— higher than pre-pandemic levels. We are expanding our plans for judicial recruitment and are making use of fee-paid judges, including those sitting in retirement – for the second year in a row, we have increased the maximum number of sitting days for all crime Recorders from 30 to 80 days. We have also legislated to raise the statutory mandatory retirement age (MRA) from 70 to 75 for judicial office holders. We believe this is an ambitious plan that will reduce the outstanding caseload in the Crown Court in the fastest way possible and allow us to meet the demand resulting from having more police on our streets. A reduction in the caseload to 53,000 will represent significant progress towards driving down waiting times for victims of crime. It is also worth highlighting that there will always be outstanding cases as these figures include cases that are being prepared to be heard in the courts. Decisions about the allocation of sitting days are decided at future Spending Reviews and through the annual Concordat process between the Ministry of Justice and the Judiciary. The Criminal Courts—Judicial Capacity in the Crown Court