Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what sanctions he has put in place for courts that fail to operate within agreed time limits for the commencement of trials.

Court performance is influenced by numerous factors which includes, but is not limited to, available judicial resource, changes in the offence and case mix and the overall performance of other justice sector agencies. Wherever our Performance Framework identifies that a court is not operating within target timescales, HMCTS will consider what support can best be offered to assist in recovering the position.