Crown Court: Opening Hours

The Government remains committed to bearing down on the Crown Court backlog and is increasing sitting days to record levels to achieve this aim. The Lord Chancellor regularly considers the impacts of additional sitting days on the outstanding caseloads, including through the Concordat process of allocating HM Courts & Tribunals Service (HMCTS) funding.

For this financial year (2025/26), this Government is funding a record allocation of Crown Court sitting days to deliver swifter justice for victims – 110,000 sitting days, 4,000 higher than the last Government funded. The total allocation of sitting days for the last financial year was up to 108,500, the highest level in almost a decade [since 2015/16].

However, the scale of cases entering the courts is now so great that, even with the Crown Court sitting at a historically high level, this would not be enough to make meaningful progress on reducing the outstanding caseload and bring down waiting times. It is clear that we must go further and do things differently if we are to deliver swifter justice and long-lasting change for victims.

This is why the Government has asked Sir Brian Leveson to chair an Independent Review of Criminal Courts, to propose once-in-a-generation reform that will improve timeliness in the courts and deliver swifter justice for victims. The first part of the Review now been published. We will carefully consider Sir Brian’s proposals before setting out the Government’s full response this autumn.