Employment Tribunals

Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames Excerpts

Thursday 2nd July 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

The noble Lord will understand that I am not going to relitigate the passing of the Employment Act all over again as part of this Question Time. The Government are managing the impact on the employment tribunal. One thing they are doing, commencing in October this year, is extending the time for individuals to make a claim from three to six months. We believe that that will help people to try to work things out beforehand or to prepare their cases better before they come to the employment tribunal. I am not sure if that entirely answers the noble Lord’s question, and I do not have the impact assessment in front of me, but I will write to him.

[Lord Marks of Henley-on-Thames (LD)]

My Lords, the noble Baroness’s view is undoubtedly that employment tribunals are intended to provide a cheap, efficient and effective way of resolving employment disputes. If she shares that view, does she not therefore agree that the issues raised by this Question and highlighted around the House are of great importance?

[Baroness Levitt (Lab)]

Absolutely—I do not think anybody who is interested in access to justice, whether it is the employment tribunal or anywhere else, can fail to be concerned by an increase in waiting times and in the open case load, which we sometimes call the backlog. There has been a huge increase in the number of cases coming into the system, not just into the courts but through ACAS. We are not entirely sure why that is, and one thing we need to do is to find out why there is an increase, but I definitely share the noble Lord’s concern.