Interpreting Services in the Courts (Public Services Committee Report)

Lord Willis of Knaresborough Excerpts

Tuesday 9th September 2025 Grand Committee

[Lord Willis of Knaresborough (LD)]

My Lords, I am grateful to have the opportunity to make a brief contribution, though it will take more than five minutes, on this report on interpretation and translation services in the courts. I welcome the new Minister and assure her that, of all the committees in this House, this is the one that provides excellent ideas, so that she can become a very successful Minister.

I confess that most of my interest during the inquiry was in how using technology, in particular AI, would resolve the challenge of the growing shortage of interpreters. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Morris of Yardley, for her patience and excellent chairmanship of the inquiry and the committee’s members and staff, who had to put up with my often confusing proposals.

The final report explained the significant challenges facing court services and the growing concern and disillusionment of interpreters, who quite frankly were being treated with unacceptable levels of support, both financially and practically. To be fair, the Minister’s contribution to the government response to the report accepted the need to modify expense, time and transport allocations for translators and for them to have access to the courts as professional colleagues, not merely members of the public. However, the real answers will become clear only when the new contract is produced, as the MoJ and the leading supply organisations have indicated.

Here lies the biggest challenge so far in response to the committee’s report. Throughout our inquiry, virtually every major criticism was answered by the future publication of a new contract, yet to date neither Parliament, the courts nor interpreters have been given sight of the future arrangements. As the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, said, we have seen some indications that the new contract will deliver improvements, particularly to strengthening qualifications—we agree on level 6—but I ask the Minister whether level 3 qualifications should be sufficient for community work and whether that would apply to asylum applications, which have been a huge issue recently. Sadly, the Government appear to have cast aside the need to create a minimum rate for interpreters and an increased rate when bookings are cancelled. However, as both the previous and present Governments have used the new contract as a saving grace, I hope that early indications are wrong. I will let others comment more sophisticatedly on that challenge.

Quite frankly, unless the new arrangement is seriously improved to not only retain existing staff but strongly appeal to new contenders, the Government have to recognise that our court system, and other legal systems that require interpreters, will face a critical future. Between 2011 and 2023, we have seen a 33% decline in registered interpreters, which has led to adjourned cases, potential growing miscarriage of justice and the use of poorly qualified individuals. This jeopardises the legal system. Yes, the decline is significantly due to the poor service offered to interpreters, but crucially also to the decline in students taking language courses who might become tomorrow’s interpreters. Between 2010 and 2021, the number of students studying level 3 languages at school fell by 50%, with 28 of the 1992 new universities no longer even offering language degrees as part of their courses.

I make the point because the demand for language interpreters is rising dramatically, with some 200 languages now required, and the increase in individuals needing interpreters is rising dramatically too. The committee, given the limited time for this short inquiry, did not include the obvious increasing challenge to our legal system from the growing numbers of immigrants—94% of whom arrived in the UK between 2018 and 2024 and who have subsequently applied for asylum. They therefore need access to legal support and assessment, which require interpreters. Given that most do not have English as their first language, support from interpreters will be required, putting added pressure for interpreters on Border Force, the Home Office, thebigword, Clear Voice and Migrant Help.

It is because of the enormous increased demand for interpreting services that I again urge the Minister to take more seriously the move to use new technologies, in particular AI, in support of that demand. I am delighted that half the speakers today had AI on their programmes; it was just one when I started. It is very sad that the Ministry of Justice constantly ignores the opportunity that AI can bring to its services, including in translation. I accept that there will be a significant number of court cases where the complexity of the legal challenge will not be overcome by the use of AI alone or by other present technologies. For example, I do not want the Minister to duplicate Donald Trump’s demand that all Medicaid contributions are initially assessed by AI before being granted. Please do not start down that way.

However, there is no doubt that AI and other technologies will have to be used, not simply to meet the huge shortage of interpreters in all public services but to improve those services dramatically by providing sophisticated analysis of arising data. To be fair, the Government have started using AI: the Home Office has used streaming algorithms to categorise visa applications and help manage the asylum system; it has used AI in combination with electronic monitoring, such as GPS ankle tags, for immigrant enforcement; and it has used AI systems to perform initial screenings of online e-visa applications, sending at-risk cases to an immigration officer rather than requiring support from interpreters.

This helps lessen the worry of many interpreters that AI will remove their work opportunities. That is simply not the case. AI in language and content interpretation will never be successful without the systematic involvement of high-level interpreters to monitor and control content.

Since the committee’s witness sessions, I have enjoyed reading the thoughts and proposals of Professor Susskind, one of the world’s leading AI enthusiasts, through his publications such as Tomorrow’s Lawyers. One I particularly recommend is Online Courts and the Future of Justice, where he quite rightly makes the point that the digital transformation of legal services is coming quickly—whether we like it or not. To be fair to the Minister, Sarah Sackman, she understood and agreed that this is the way forward but, without a very strong and positive agenda, it will emerge only when chaos demands. This was an excellent report and this is a wonderful opportunity for the Minister to respond to it and be noted for bringing AI to the centre of this work.