open goal for Labour

Campaigning and Policy

I was interested to read today that Paul Shamplina is pressing for a date to implement repeal of S21. His rationale is that it will force the pace and clarity of court reform and I suspect he is also worried that if nothing has been done by the time of the election then the (Labour) minister will declare at his sole discretion the Courts fit for purpose and repeal the clause.

But don't hold your breath. If I u/s correctly there was £1m+ allocated and a further £11m mentioned on Wednesday for this in the Commons debate. in 2021 there were 1.6m civil cases and 1.24m crim so fairly similar. In 2005 (when govt had money) they allocated over 10 years £700m to reform of the courts and tribunals and a further £270m to criminal courts for a partial success (as reviewed in 2015). 

Based on these numbers and timings I believe there is no chance of meaningful reform and so sadly consider it to be an open goal to Labour. The Tories laid all the groundwork for Labour to implement without court reform and it is a fair criticism that the Tories shouls have done something about what has been a crisis for some time.  NRLA supported but it may not have made much of a difference. The politicans were and are out for blood and were not listening. End of rant.