Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what is (1) the percentage of the total number, and (2) the actual number, of court rooms in the Crown Court estate of England and Wales not being used for trials; and how long has each Crown Court centre had unused court rooms.

Prior to the March lockdown there were over 450 Crown Court rooms available for use. Jury trials were paused on 23rd March. Since then we have undertaken reconfiguration of our estate to comply with social distancing measures.

The availability of rooms fluctuates day by day, but as of the end of December 2020 we had over 290 Crown Court rooms available for Jury trials across the existing HMCTS estate, plus 120 rooms available for non-jury trial business. This comprises more than 80% of the total conventional Crown Court estate. In addition, we have 13 Jury rooms from Nightingale venues, which provide a total of 40 rooms overall across the estate. There are circa 80 Crown Court rooms not currently in use for hearings for a variety of reasons, including use as overspill accommodation in multi-hander (i.e. multi-defendant) trials to facilitate use of operational courtrooms, unsuitability for socially distanced hearings or to allow for continued maintenance.

Each Crown Court will, at times, have unused court rooms as utilisation of rooms is dependent upon a number of factors which include listing practices, availability of parties and trial outcomes.

This Government is doing everything possible to respond to the challenge of COVID-19, and the impact it has had on the justice system. We are working hard to deliver additional capacity through Nightingale Courts with an aim to have a total of 60 such courtrooms open by the end of March 2021.