A radical blueprint to reform the UK's creaking employment tribunal system has been proposed by Faculty of Law researchers in collaboration with the Employment Lawyers Association (ELA), following evidence that some claimants face waits of up to five years for full hearings.
The proposals are detailed in a major new report backed by the ELA titled 'Reimagining Employment Dispute Resolution and Enforcement'. The research, co-authored by Professor Catherine Barnard, Professor of European, and Sarah Fraser Butlin KC, Affiliated Lecturer, warns that escalating pressure has seen the number of outstanding claims nearly double over the past five years. Outstanding cases have climbed from 32,000 in autumn 2022 to almost 60,000 at present.
The research shows that a significant driver of the backlog is the rising volume of legally complex and document-heavy discrimination and whistleblowing claims, which now constitute up to 70% of all cases received by tribunals. This has been further exacerbated by the increasing use of AI tools by litigants-in-person, which often floods the system with vast volumes of irrelevant documentation.
With the phased introduction of the Employment Rights Act expected to increase tribunal caseloads by up to a third over the coming year, Professor Barnard warned that legislative progress risks being undermined by systemic delays.
"The government's landmark employment legislation will be an empty vessel if the employment tribunals do not have the capacity to enforce those new rights and quickly" Professor Barnard said.
The government's landmark employment legislation will be an empty vessel if the employment tribunals do not have the capacity to enforce those new rights and quickly Catherine Barnard
To address the crisis, the blueprint proposes a comprehensive structural overhaul. Key recommendations include the introduction of compulsory mediation for all claims and the division of the tribunal system into three distinct tracks based on the financial value of the dispute:
- A low-value track for simple claims under £20,000, which would be managed by legal officers without costs or fees, involving a judge only if strictly necessary.
- A mid-value track for claims up to two years' earnings, featuring mandatory early neutral evaluation, restricted evidence volumes, and strict five-day limits on hearings.
- A high-value track for complex disputes, operating under rules similar to those used in the High Court.
Reflecting on the human cost of the delays, Sarah Fraser Butlin KC added: "After your family, your job is the most important relationship in your life. When things go wrong, you want a quick, effective resolution. The employment tribunal system was set up to deliver just that. But no more. Cases are now being listed in some areas for 2030. This is not access to justice. Radical reform of employment tribunals is needed urgently."
The empirical and theoretical findings under-pinning these proposals will be explored further in the authors' forthcoming book, Reimagining Employment Dispute Resolution and Enforcement, which is due to be published by Hart Publishing, an imprint of Bloomsbury, in June. The book will draw on a large-scale empirical study to reframe workplace conflict resolution, borrowing insights from the management of family law disputes to design a sustainable system for policy makers, practitioners, and academics alike.
Related links
- Reimagining Employment Dispute Resolution and Enforcement (Hart, Forthcoming)
- Unfair dismissal claims face five-year delay as tribunal backlog grows (BBC News)
- Employment lawyers draw up radical plans for cutting tribunal backlog (Law Society Gazette)
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