Ian McDonald, Chris Roberts & Kate Wilson breakdown the key proposals in the Interim Report on the Structure of the Civil Courts
In January, Lord Justice Briggs published an interim report of his review on the structure of the Civil Courts in England and Wales (the report). While the final report is due to be published by the end of July 2016, the report invites urgent feedback on a package of measures which will be of particular interest to commercial litigators—proposals aimed at improving waiting times in the Court of Appeal (CofA). Decisions on these proposals are to be made in early March.
The report is premised on the successful implementation of the wider HMCTS Reform Programme to make the court system, ie all the criminal, civil and family courts and tribunals, “digital by design and by default”. This is not expected to be completed before 2020. It also takes into account that there has been an increase in the number of litigants in person (LIPs) using the courts, and that such cases absorb more resources than those with representation.
While headlines have
