Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the impact of waiting times at the First-tier Tribunal (Social Security and Child Support Chamber) on claimants’ financial wellbeing.

Data on Tribunals performance is published by the Ministry of Justice on a quarterly basis. Receipts, disposals and the outstanding caseload for individual Chambers in the First-tier Tribunal and Upper Tribunal, the Employment Tribunal and the Employment Appeal Tribunal can be found at the link below: https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/tribunals-statistics.

The Ministry of Justice is working to reduce the outstanding caseload across the Social Entitlement Chamber of the First-tier Tribunal, which includes the Social Security and Child Support jurisdiction. This is key to reducing the waiting time for tribunal hearings.

The Department continues to invest in improving tribunal capacity and productivity through the recruitment of additional Judges, the deployment of Legal Officers to actively manage cases, the development of modern case management systems, and the use of remote hearing technology. We expect these actions to have a positive effect, improving timeliness and overall performance in the Social Entitlement Chamber.

The Ministry of Justice has not conducted assessments of the impact of tribunal waiting times on claimants but we recognise the potential negative impacts and uncertainty for individuals waiting for their appeal to be resolved.