Courts brace for eviction surge as house possession cases resume

An extra 200 deputy district judges have been drafted in to help with house possession cases, which were expected to resume today as the Gazette went to press following a six-month moratorium.

The judicial back-up was revealed in a document drawn up by a cross-sector working group convened by the master of the rolls outlining overall arrangements for possession proceedings.

An immediate surge of evictions is considered unlikely, as the document states that claims brought before 3 August will not be listed, relisted or referred to a judge until a party serves a reactivation notice. A party filing and serving a reactivation notice must propose new dates for directions and a proposed hearing date, or state that an existing hearing can be met. The arrangements also include a review date before the case proceeds to substantive hearing.

Court centres will, as far as possible, allocate to possession proceedings the same number of courtrooms and days per week as before March.

The preferred starting point for the opening months is to use full-time district judges and deputy district judges who sit extensively at the particular court centre. ‘In addition, a cadre of 200 additional deputy district judges (and property tribunal judges) has been assembled to assist as required,’ the document says.

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and Ministry of Justice are funding an independent facilitated negotiation/mediation pilot.

If the duty scheme solicitor thinks a case has a reasonable chance of being settled, but the case is too challenging to be resolved by negotiation on the review date itself, the duty solicitor may refer the case to the pilot. The claimant and defendant must agree to participate in mediation within the next seven days after the review date.

The pilot will deal with a maximum of 7,000 cases.

Details of how the pilot is being funded and will operate are still being finalised.

 

Kindly shared by The Law Society Gazette

Main article photo courtesy of Pixabay