Transparency data

Strategic Engagement Group Meeting – Chair’s Summary – 5 December 2023

Updated 15 December 2023

Applies to England and Wales

1. Introduction

This document summarises the discussion of the Strategic Engagement Group (StratEG) meeting held online on 5 December 2023. This meeting was held online.

Members of the Bar Council, Law Society and Chartered Institute of Legal Executives met representatives of HMCTS and Ministry of Justice (MoJ) for the latest quarterly meeting.

The meeting included verbal updates covering:

• Operational and strategic overview
• Court estate update
• Future Hearings

Three presentations covered:

• Accessibility, reasonable adjustments and HMCTS
• CFT Ecosystem Mapping
• MyHMCTS: a cross-service overview

2. Operational and strategic overview

Work is ongoing to look at plans for the reform programme during the year ahead and further engagement with group members and their organisations will take place in 2024.

Additional judges have been appointed and trained to sit in the upper tribunal in preparation for the implementation of the Illegal Migration Act.

Additional mediators have been recruited and are in training in preparation for civil mediation becoming mandatory in 2024. Most small claims will be referred automatically for mediation and those who fail to mediate will then progress to a final judicial hearing. Work is ongoing to increase mediation referrals within the next two months.

Two pathfinder court pilots on integrated domestic abuse courts and Family Courts have been running in Dorset and North Wales since February 2022. They are in the final stages of formal evaluation and the next steps include rolling out to two additional areas.

3. Court estate update

A verbal update confirmed there are approximately 350 operational properties within the HMCTS estate, varying from heritage sites to more modern buildings.

Work is ongoing to rectify issues relating to the aging of some buildings. All issues are assigned a prioritisation category, with the most important aspect being any health and safety-related issues.

New sites are being developed, including the replacement of Blackpool Magistrates’ Court, the London Tribunals building and a new court in the City of London, which are due to be completed over the coming years.

4. Accessibility, reasonable adjustments and HMCTS

The presentation outlined the importance of ensuring HMCTS buildings are accessible to all. It acknowledged the challenges around accessing tribunal buildings, as some are historic sites, constructed prior to the Equality Act 2010.

Accessibility is embedded into all induction materials for new joiners allowing it to embed in HMCTS culture from the start of a staff member’s career with the organisation.

Further services such as large print documents, audio/easy to read guidance and hearing enhancement systems have been introduced to support user needs.

The use of support animals in court is being reviewed and a greater understanding of the type of animals that can come into court considered.

In partnership with the British Sign Language, the first deaf juror was able to have a sign language interpreter with them during jury service in 2022 and has since opened the door for others who have taken part in jury service.

HMCTS has joined the Sunflower Lanyard scheme, allowing court visitors to discreetly indicate they may need additional support, with over 3,000 having been issued so far.

Work is also being carried out to enhance user access and experience and to provide support for people who may not have access to technology or lack the confidence to use it.

5. Future Hearings

A verbal update on the Video Hearings Service (VHS) was followed by a discussion with members on ways in which the VHS team can engage with legal professionals who attend Chester Crown Court, which is hosting a pathfinder project.

6. CFT Ecosystem Mapping

Ministry of Justice colleagues presented a Civil, Family and Tribunals (CFT) ecosystem map, part of a vision for the future of CFT. It places an emphasis on the need to connect with offline and online services to ensure a seamless journey for users and is the first time that user experience has been captured in a non-linear way.

The map will provide empirical evidence of the user experience, allowing for further enhancements of potential policy interventions.

A number of digital products are being developed to host guidance and grant access to dispute resolution services.

7. MyHMCTS: a cross-service overview

MyHMCTS is a web-based tool that enables legal professionals, judges, and HMCTS staff to create, view and manage cases digitally.

Users are able to register for an account, review organisation details, manage user access, view assigned and unassigned cases and manage Payment by Account details.

Delivery of the service is not yet complete but enhancements are planned for the next few months to ensure everyone can access the system consistently, including Welsh language services.

8. Reform programme – jurisdictional updates

Written jurisdictional updates were provided to the group, as agreed under the revised Terms of Reference.

8.1 Crime

Common Platform is in every criminal court in England and Wales. A review of system enhancements and releases, and timelines for delivery is ongoing.

The delivery timeline the strategic Scheduling and Listing solution has been extended by up to 15 months, delivering by the end of March 2025.

All British Transport Police cases and police cases initiated by summons are being received onto Common Platform.

Magistrates use of Automated Track Case Management went live on 27 November 2023.

Police Single Justice Procedure roll out for forces in South-East and Wales region commenced on 11 December 2023.

8.2 Future Hearings

Work continues with the refinement of features to ensure that the video hearing service is accessible to all. A number of new features are in train to be delivered ahead of national roll out which is anticipated to commence in late summer 2024.

Video hearings are currently trialling a 12-week pathfinder at Chester Crown Court as an evaluation of the business processes and user experience is being taken by HMCTS’ user insight team and findings will be reported in the new year.

ListAssist is being developed further to support those services that are using it.

Following the success of the Social Security and Child Support (SSCS) early adopter pilot in Cardiff, plans are in progress to onboard further SSCS sites.

8.3 Civil

Notice of Change was released in two services and now allows a legal representative to come on record in a case issued against a litigant in person.

A Certificate of Service was released for Damages Claims and this allows a legal representative to confirm service of a claim.

The ability for legal professionals to pay court fees by card as well as payment by account was released.

Digital notifications now go out to legal representatives when a refund has been approved.

8.4 Family

In August 2023, the Private Family Law Service paused accepting new applications in Swansea due to several failures within the digital system. Since then, the project has held in-depth analysis sessions to review the service and identify areas to apply fixes.

Work has commenced to rectify the issues that have been identified. The project is now working towards re-commencing accepting new applications in late January 2024. Once the service is working as intended in all early adopter sites, the service will be nationally roll-out to remaining courts.

A national roll out of the adoption online service completed at the end October to all adoption courts and the associated local authorities. This service is available to litigants in person. Around 256 applications have been issued on the service to date.

The next steps are to enter a public beta phase following a successful Government Digital Service assessment and is scheduled to take place early next year.

8.5 Tribunals

On 11 and 12 September 2023 enhancements following feedback received from the early adopter sites was released.

On 25 October the global search functionality which is a common component to the four early adopter sites was released and as of yet, only those with multi-jurisdictional access can view the new fields.

On 15 November 2023 the project released the case flags and case linking functionality which are also common components to our four early adopter sites.

On 21 November 2023 the case file view functionality was released to the early adopter sites and provides the ability for the Employment Tribunal service to categorise case documents in pre-agreed folders and sub-folders.

9. Next meeting

The next meeting will be on 5 March 2024.