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This White Paper is about improving public services and improving access to justice - administrative justice and justice in the workplace.
Central and local government make millions of decisions each year about the rights and obligations of individuals. Each of us has the right to expect the State to get decisions right but no system will ever be perfect. Where mistakes occur, or where there is uncertainty we are entitled to complain and to have any mistakes put right with minimum difficulty. Similarly, employees are entitled to fair and decent standards in the workplace and some means of redress where these standards are breached. Tribunals deal with about a million cases a year. They are one means of redress but not the only one.
Sir Andrew Leggatt in his report Tribunals for Users - One System, One Service, set out a convincing case for reform of tribunals. The Government agrees that reform is necessary and this White Paper acts as a formal response to Sir Andrew's report. But the programme of reform set out in this White Paper goes further than just looking at tribunals - it looks at the administrative justice system as a whole and sets out proposals to improve the whole end to end dispute resolution process.
The White Paper takes as its starting point what users want. They want to achieve something. They are not volunteering for the experience of going before a tribunal, instead, they are in search of a solution to some problem they have which, as the system now stands, only a tribunal can provide. If they can get resolution of their dispute easily and early, without going to a tribunal, they would much prefer this.
The White Paper is therefore as much concerned with how the system can resolve disputes at source rather than in tribunals. This means helping to improve standards of decision making across government and, where things do go wrong, promoting quicker and more effective means of dispute resolution, so that fewer cases come before tribunals.
This approach to proportionate dispute resolution is the first manifestation of the department's new strategy for helping users of the justice system resolve issues without recourse to formal hearings.
At the heart of the proposals are plans for a unified service, replacing the existing fragmented arrangement. The basis for the new organisation will be the largest tribunal organisations administered by central government, collectively responsible for more than 90% of tribunal cases. It will formally come into being in April 2006 but we are recruiting a Chief Executive now.
Bringing the largest central government tribunals together in a single service will ensure a more effective and efficient delivery of tribunals justice. But the new body will be more than just a federation of existing tribunals. It will be a new organisation and a new type of organisation. It will have two central pillars: administrative justice appeals and employment cases. Its mission will be to help prevent and resolve disputes, using any appropriate method and working with its partners in and out of government, and to help improve administrative justice and justice in the workplace, so that the need for dispute is reduced.
The new organisation will comprise tribunal members and staff working together to provide a range of established and innovative services to tribunal users and to those who currently do not seek redress from the system. The White Paper outlines plans to pilot new services.
The administrative arm of this new organisation will be an executive agency as part of the Department for Constitutional Affairs. It will be provisionally known as the Tribunals Service, although the White Paper seeks suggestions for a new name for the organisation as a whole.
The new organisation will be focussed on the needs of users and potential users of the system. Users can expect a range of benefits including:
Bringing the tribunals' judiciary together in a single service will also strengthen the independence of the judiciary and allow greater flexibility in the way they are deployed. The White Paper sets out a number of judicial reforms including:
We also believe structural changes are needed to some parts of the tribunal system to bring about the more coherent system we envisage. Therefore the White Paper also sets out plans for a number of other reforms including creating:
If you have any queries about the White Paper then do e-mail us.