Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what steps she is taking to reduce the backlog of crown court cases in the West Midlands.

This Government inherited a record and rising courts backlog. For this financial year (2025/26), this Government is funding a record allocation of Crown Court sitting days to deliver swifter justice for victims – 110,000 sitting days this year, 4,000 higher than the last Government funded. However, the scale of the challenge is beyond what increasing sitting days can achieve. That is why we have commissioned Sir Brian Leveson to conduct a review of efficiency that will propose once-in-a-generation reform to deliver swifter justice for victims.

In the West Midlands:

• Over the past three years, the West Midlands Crown Court centres have experienced a significant increase in receipts, rising by 40%, a figure that surpasses the national average of 30%. This growth reflects the increasing demand on the judicial system in the region.
• In response to this rising caseload, the Crown Court centres in the West Midlands (Birmingham Crown Court and Wolverhampton Crown Court) have proactively increased their operational capacity, sitting a total of 5655 days in 2024/25 (an increase of 3.8% from 5450 days in 2023/24).
• Wolverhampton Crown Court has expanded its capacity from seven to eight courtrooms, with the addition of an extra courtroom at Telford Annex. Furthermore, in 2023 Wolverhampton welcomed an increase in circuit judges, and Birmingham saw an extra circuit judge last year, thus strengthening the judiciary to manage the rising volume of cases. Efforts are also underway to bolster judicial resources further, with plans for additional judicial recruitment in an upcoming campaign.