It is a well known adage that “justice delayed is justice denied” and a good settlement is better than a good law suit. To this I would add “a good mediation is better than a good trial.”
Delays in the Courts increases stress and costs. No doubt Courts have been affected by coronavirus but nonetheless cases seem to take a long time to progress, which must be frustrating to many people waiting for Justice. I have personal experience as an advocate with hearings being cancelled the day before or the day of trial itself because of over listing or shortage of judges.
I would suggest that it is well worth considering mediation and alternative dispute resolution to try to resolve disputes more quickly. Although ADR does require some compromise, rather than one party “winning” a case, it can be better to recover a lower amount in damages but be paid sooner. It should also be born in mind that sometimes even a winning party can effectively lose because the Court decides they do not recover all their legal costs or they have to pay the other party their costs. Sometimes a successful party can find it difficult to obtain payment from the other party without incurring more costs or a defendant can go bust.
https://acso.org.uk/news/202205/civil-cases-taking-years-come-court-new-data-shows-civil-justice-postcode-lottery
Significant court delays for civil justice cases have been identified following research from Express Solicitors and the Association of Consumer Support Organisations (ACSO) into Court delays looking at 8,500 fast track and multi-track claims.
In some Courts the parties have to wait an average 350 days between a Claim Form being served and a case completing the first costs and case management conference (CCMC)
It is reported that “Some consumers using Thanet County Court are having to wait over 456 days (15 months) for cases to complete the first CCMC. Chelmsford (426 days) and Reading (424) are next worst, followed by Bournemouth (394) and Durham (377).”
In the best performing regions of England and Wales, the average wait is 236 and 235 days respectively.
In six out of ten regions, consumers have to wait more than nine months to have their claim subject to a Case management conference, let alone trial.
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