Criminal courts will sit for another 2,000 days this year in a bid to tackle the backlog in the justice system, Shabana Mahmood has said.
The Justice Secretary revealed to a committee of MPs that the costs to HM Courts and Tribunal Service (HMCTS) of the extra sitting time between now and April would be £1 million.
Ms Mahmood told the Commons Justice Committee that since Labour came to power, she had already expanded the number of court sitting days by 500, with a total of 106,500 days now available across the course of the 2024-25 year.
The extra 2,000 takes the total to 108,500 sitting days for courts in England and Wales this year, the highest figure in nearly a decade according to the Ministry of Justice (MoJ).
The head of the judiciary, Lady Chief Justice Baroness Carr, told the Commons committee in November that judges had capacity for as many as 113,000 sitting days this year, but the Government had not funded them.
“Just over two weeks ago, I was advised that there was some additional headroom expected due to what I would say are standard fluctuations in budget, but that might give me the capacity to sit more in crown court this year,” the Justice Secretary Ms Mahmood told MPs on Tuesday.
She added: “I’ve asked HMCTS to give me an indication of what can physically be achieved between now and the end of March, and I am advised, I have received assurances, that the 2,000 which I’ve made allocation for can be sat.”
The extra days will cost £1 million to HMCTS, Ms Mahmood said, with a further £8 million legal aid costs expected as a result for the Government.
The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) published court backlog figures for the first time in several months last week, which showed the number of criminal cases waiting to be dealt with by crown courts in England and Wales stood at 73,105 at the end of September.
This backlog has grown significantly since before the pandemic, when it stood at approximately 38,000.
Ms Mahmood told the Justice Committee getting the backlog down was an “absolute top priority” for her.
She added: “It’s why I have sent the steer to the system that I have, which is trying to maximise as much as possible within the funding envelope I have the sittings that we can make available in the crown court, and I’ve been pleased to make a bit more progress on that in the last day or so.”
The Justice Secretary also said she had begun negotiating a settlement with the courts system for next year’s number of sitting days.
Ms Mahmood said she hoped for a resolution to these talks “by the end of January, beginning of February of next year”.
In the longer term, the Government hopes to undertake major reforms to the court system and has tasked Sir Brian Leveson with leading a review aimed at identifying areas which can be overhauled.
