The Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Justice (Shabana Mahmood)
As I informed the House earlier today, each financial year the Government and the judiciary seek to agree a number of sitting days, within an overall budget for His Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service (HMCTS), through what is known as the concordat process. Jurisdiction Sitting Day Allocation Crown 110,000 Magistrates (Crime) 114,000 Civil 74,300 Family 97,300 Court of Protection 4,900 Immigration and Asylum Chamber* 14,400 Social Security and Child Support** 23,000 Employment 33,900 Mental Health 17,000 Other tribunals (Specials) *** 36,100 *This allocation includes Ministry of Justice baseline funding only, and we expect it to sit above this level using funding from other sources. ** This figure includes funding from the Ministry of Justice and the Department for Work and Pensions. *** This figure only represents the sitting days included in the Ministry of Justice’s baseline funding. There are long-standing agreements with other Government Departments whereby they provide funding for capacity in specific tribunals. Additional days will be sat as a result of this additional funding.
I publicly committed to concluding the concordat earlier than in previous years and to introduce greater transparency. We have now concluded this process, several months ahead of last year’s process. I am also—for the first time—publishing the total sitting day allocations by jurisdiction. Taken together, this will mean greater certainty for the courts and tribunals to allow them to plan ahead and greater clarity for the public.
In terms of the settlement itself, I am pleased to confirm that for 2025-26, the Ministry of Justice will provide a total budget of £2,538 million (£2,332 million fiscal resource funding and £206 million capital funding).
This Government inherited a record and rising backlog in the Crown court. The backlog now stands at 73,000 cases, twice the figure of five years ago. The human cost of these delays is considerable—victims are waiting years for justice, and attrition in rape cases has more than doubled in the last five years.
This settlement means that the Crown court will be funded to sit up to 110,000 sitting days in this financial year. The increase will mean more trials will be heard in the coming year, helping victims see justice faster than they otherwise would have done.
It is also both the highest sitting day allocation made since HMCTS was created and the biggest fiscal resource settlement ever made for the Crown court. It is, in all respects, unprecedented and reflects how much importance I place on tackling the backlog.
Even outside the Crown court, this settlement constitutes the highest ever level of resource funding for the justice system, with allocations at or close to the maximum judicial capacity in almost every jurisdiction. This budget will also enable the magistrates to sit up to 114,000 days, the family court to sit up to 97,300 days and the civil court to sit up to 74,300 days.
With regard to tribunals, for the employment tribunal we will provide funding to support 33,900 sitting days, and for the social security and child support tribunal, funding will be provided to support 23,000 sitting days.
For the immigration and asylum chamber, we will provide funding to support 14,400 sitting days, and we expect to be able to increase this substantially with additional funding from the Home Office, helping to speed up asylum claims. This builds on the Government’s work to restore order to the immigration system so that every part—border security, case processing, appeals and returns—operates efficiently.
The table below summarises the sitting day allocations:
The record level of investment in our justice system for this financial year makes clear this Government’s commitment to improving the productivity and efficiency of our courts and tribunals. This should be our focus moving forward and is why I have appointed Sir Brian Leveson to conduct a wholesale review of our criminal courts.
Sir Brian will consider how the Crown court can be reformed to ensure cases are dealt with proportionately, including the case for moving more cases to the magistrates courts and the case for a new court to sit between the magistrates court and the Crown court.
The review’s recommendations will come later this spring. I expect the review to deliver recommendations that will improve the overall efficiency of the courts and there will be a role for all criminal justice partners to play to ensure that, together, we are delivering swift access to justice for victims.
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