The Employment Lawyers’ Association’s annual survey of members found that responses to correspondence and applications with tribunals were taking longer than a year ago. Most (77%) respondents said that final hearings were being listed over a year after the issue of a claim – this had increased by 27% from the previous year.
Tribunals in the London central, London south, Watford, Reading and Cardiff areas were reported to be most affected by delays and capacity issues, leading cases to be transferred to other courts, often a significant distance from the original location. One-third of respondents said they had been involved in transferred cases.
Paul McFarlane, chair of ELA’s Legislative & Policy Committee and Legal Director at Capsticks Solicitors was quoted as saying: “Cases are transferred, at the last minute, where there are not enough Judges or lay members at a hearing centre to hear a case. Last year I had a case where the day before the hearing we were told it was going to be transferred from Exeter to Bristol! We had to notify our client, all of the witnesses and our barrister of this change, who then had to rearrange their travel and accommodation at very short notice.
“All those involved not only incurred the additional costs, but for the witnesses, having to arrange last-minute changes to their travel is likely to increase the stress they are under before they are due to give evidence, which cannot be a good thing for the administration of justice.”
It wasn’t all doom and gloom, however. Some areas did show slight improvement on 2018 survey results.
- Fewer ELA members reported an increase in the time tribunals were taking to deal with claims (66%, down from 75% last year)
- The number of single claims lodged in employment tribunals had risen by a modest 6%, and multiple claims by 13%
- 50 employment judges had recently been recruited and there was a plan to recruit further fee-paid judges
Despite this Unison lawyer and ELA tribunal working party member Shantha David was critical:
“These numbers paint a bleak picture of the country’s employment tribunal system. Almost two years after the abolition of fees, why is it that tribunals are still unable to cope?”
She went on to comment that the system desperately required more judicial and administrative resources to reduce the long delays, regular cancellations of preliminary and full hearings – often last-minute – because of a lack of judicial resources, cases being re-listed at a much later date, telephones going unanswered for hours and a lack of responses to correspondence and applications including urgent applications.
She stated that these issues caused ‘embarrassment for lawyers forced to explain [these delays] to clients, [leading] to a loss of confidence in the rule of law’.
