Transparency data

Chair’s Summary – Strategic Engagement Group Meeting 18 January 2022

Published 1 February 2022

1. Introduction

This document summarises the discussion of the Strategic Engagement Group (StratEG) meeting held on 18 January 2022. The meeting was held by video, rather than face-to-face due to the pandemic. The meeting was extended on this occasion due to the number of presentations and updates on Reform projects.

Members of the Bar Council, Law Society and Chartered Institute of Legal Executives met with the jurisdictional leads for HMCTS’ court reform programme and the HMCTS corporate relations team for the latest 8-weekly update and discussion.

The Chair opened the meeting and outlined the agenda which included four presentations on the evaluation of remote hearings during the COVID-19 pandemic, an update on MyHMCTS, an update on Family Public Law Digital Service and a verbal update on Common Platform.

2. Court reform

Each jurisdiction updated on their area, as well as on impact of the pandemic on project delivery.

The Reform Plan update reported that the Wi-Fi project was complete, as was the Magistrates’ Court design validation in future operations. The possession project, in civil, had not yet commenced.

In the civil jurisdiction, access to the Online Civil Money Claims service that has been available to litigants-in-persons is being made available for legal practitioners for claims up to £25,000 in June. The next release in the Damages Claims service will expand the service to accept multiparty claims.

In the family jurisdiction, financial remedy consent order turnaround is three to four weeks from receipt to final order. The service has been released in 18 financial remedy centres. In family private law, the user journey for solicitors should be ready for release in April. The domestic abuse journey will be released later in 2022. In the adoption project a digital application pilot is planned in ten sites from March. The ‘No Fault Divorce’ Act will come in April.

In the tribunals jurisdiction, and Social Security and Child Support First-tier Tribunal, the next release will be the new SSCS 2 appeal form (child support). This is followed by the new SSCS 5 appeal form (HMRC appeals). The Appellant in Person (AIP) digital service will include an AIP journey for appeals from out of the country (UK) and a journey for bail. The final technical release of CE file is complete and e-filing extended to the Court of Appeal and Upper Tribunal Immigration and Asylum Chamber.

In the crime jurisdiction, the Single Justice Procedure has approved the further roll-out of the Single Justice Service 3:1 ratio of Legal Advisers to magistrates. The project is also working on reducing the number of unrepresented defendants. The pilot will run for 6 months. Design continues for functionality in phase 2 of the Common Platform, some of which will be used by prosecution and defence.

The Police, Crime, Sentencing, and Courts Bill (PCSC Bill) has reached report stage in the House of Lords and is hoped will achieve royal assent by February 2022. The remaining HMCTS Reform Programme provisions affecting the criminal courts are included in the Judicial Review Bill, which has completed committee stage in the House of Commons.

An update on Common Platform was presented at the meeting - see below.

In the future hearings jurisdiction, the video hearings implementation is progressing chamber by chamber; all tribunals should be using the service by the end of March. The change of platform from Cloud Video Platform (CVP) and other video hearing tools to the Video Hearing (VH) Service will provide better hearing functionality.

The project was preparing for more adopter sites, and a mix of courts, in the civil and family jurisdictions. The pilot at Birmingham Civil and Family Justice Centre and engagement with legal professionals provided valuable learning. The project is working with the crime programme to include the crime jurisdiction in this service over the next few months.

The scheduling and listing ListAssist tool is being implemented across all county courts following the pilot at Oxford. The project is also working on integration of ListAssist and case management systems. There has been good feedback from the publications and information project user testing with legal professionals and media working group volunteers.

3. Evaluation of remote hearings during the COVID-19 pandemic

A rapid implementation review of the use of remote hearings was completed in August 2020 and followed by a large-scale, in-depth evaluation of the revised processes. The purpose of the evaluation was to establish who attended remote hearings, experience of remote hearings and the attitudes towards remote hearings.

The full evaluation report is available on GOV.UK.

The recommendations are summarised as: * ensuring guidance and information is shared with all relevant parties * ensuring all vulnerable users are aware of the support and reasonable adjustments they can request * ensuring effective communication between parties before and during hearing to alert if parties drop off a call

The next steps are summarised as: * findings are used to plan developments to services, during 2022 there will be a move away from CVP to the Video Hearings service * the Video Hearings service is designed to meet the specific needs of court and tribunal hearings * the Video Hearings service better reflects the formality of a court hearing and improves on the services used during the pandemic

An evaluation of the Video Hearings Service will be commissioned this year to see whether the views on remote hearings change.

4. MyHMCTS update

Services mandated for use on MyHMCTS by professional users include Divorce, Financial Remedy (FR), Immigration and Asylum Chamber (IAC) and Family Public Law (FPL). Family Private Law is on-boarding to MyHMCTS. The ‘No-fault divorce’ service will be launched on MyHMCTS.

Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) has been introduced for all services and Share a Case is live in Divorce, FR, and Civil Damages. IAC and FPL are the first adopters. Share a Case will also be used by Probate, Family Private Law, Adoption and Employment Tribunals.

Civil Damages service is in private beta. Family Private Law, Adoption and Employment Tribunals will go into private betas. Respondent journey is live in Divorce, FR, FPL, and Civil damages. Notice of Change is live for FPL and IAC and will be used by Probate, Divorce, FR, Civil Damages, Family Private Law, Adoption and Employment Tribunals.

5. Family Public Law digital service update

The roll-out of the digital service commenced in April 2021 and has been mandated in all areas except Central Family Court and East London Family Court, which are due to be mandated in early 2022. 96% of all local authorities had on-boarded on the digital service. The project nvites legal professionals to feedback on where the service can be improved via the publiclawandadoptions@justice.gov.uk inbox.

The presentation provided reminders about the digital systems and guidance to avoid duplicating what the system is designed to do. Further releases will include the ability to issue placement applications on the Family Public Law service, and child representative able to add a barrister to a case.

Plans for the next 6 months will continue to improve and enhance the service based on user feedback. As remaining designated family judge courts are mandated, we will continue to support local staff, judges, and users of the service during transition.

6. Common Platform update

As reported at the previous meeting there are 101 courts live on Common Platform (CP) – 32 Crown Courts and 69 magistrates’ courts. Roll-out to additional courts remains paused currently but the programme is planning to roll out to 126 courts when ready to do so.

Phase 2 of the roll-out will include replacing the digital case systems at Crown Courts. The programme team is working with the Crown Prosecution Service, legal practitioners and other stakeholders on enhancements including reviewing the Unique Reference Number and access to case papers on CP for defence.

Communications and emails were circulated to defence practitioners where their accounts had lapsed, with guidance on resetting their accounts and passwords for CP. They have been reminded to log into accounts within 90 days to keep them live.

7. Contract for court-appointed intermediary service

The court-appointed intermediary service project will soon invite comments on a draft guidance document and forms about the service from a small group of legal practitioners.

8. Next meeting

The next Strategic Engagement Group meeting is scheduled for 15 March 2022. As lockdown and shielding restrictions have been removed, the group is reviewing the return to in-person meetings.

Caroline Olaiya Head of Corporate Relations, HMCTS Chair of Strategic Engagement Group