Martin Partington: Spotlight on the Justice System

The headline features of the Transformation: Courts and Tribunals 2022 programme have been about major changes to the ways in which courts and tribunals work: on-line courts, digitization of process, investment in IT and so on.

But in parallel with these major changes, other more technical changes are being contemplated which it is hoped will improve the efficiency of the work of courts and tribunals.

The recently announced (26 September 2018) consultation paper Employment Law Hearing Structures is an example of how the government is seeking to take this opportunity to make some technical changes to the ways in which  courts and tribunals dealing with employment and discrimination cases interact.

For example:

• At present Employment Tribunals can only claims for contractual damages, where the damages claimed are below £25,000;
• Employment Tribunals operate on a ‘no-costs’ basis – i.e. the winner of the case cannot seek an order for costs from the losing party;
• Employment Tribunals have no power to make an order to enforce a decision that it has made.
• Courts have exclusive jurisdiction over no-employment discrimination cases

These and other rules mean that there can be circumstances in which cases have to go to courts that might be better dealt with by the tribunal, and vice versa.

The detail of the proposals in the Consultation Paper are not considered here, though of great importance to specialist employment lawyers and other interested in employment matters.

But the existence of the consultation is flagged here to indicate yet more ways in which the detailed work of courts and tribunals is likely to be amended under the general banner of the Transformation programme.

(A similar exercise, though not currently the subject of a public consultation, is ongoing in the context of the resolution of housing and property disputes where  complex boundaries have to be negotiated between tribunals and courts which mean that cases may need to be launched in more than one forum. There is likely to be greater public debate on these issues when the promised Consultation Paper on a new Housing Court is published later in 2018.)

The Law Commission’s Consultation Paper can be seen at https://www.lawcom.gov.uk/consultation-launched-into-how-employment-law-disputes-are-decided/

The Consultation runs till January 2019. Final recommendations will be published in 2019.