- A new briefing from the Centre for Policy Studies argues that Britain’s tribunal system has become swollen, costly and damaging to growth
- Between 2019/20 and 2024/5, the number of new immigration cases increased from 42,293 to 79,074. The number of welfare cases increased from 93,303 to 132,965. And the number of special educational needs and disability cases soared from 7,694 to 23,861
- The cost of SEND appeals – which local authorities lose between 96% and 99% of the time – would be enough to fund nearly 10,000 additional SEND places in mainstream schools
- The report also shows that the doctrine of ‘equal value’ is likely to result in billions more in equal pay claims for retailers, gig economy firms and local councils. The GMB union alone has 40,000 claims outstanding across 26 local authorities, and intends to launch a further 10,000
- The report argues that the fundamental problem is an imbalance between costs for litigants and defendants. For the Employment Tribunal, a claimant pays nothing to file, yet employers will spend between £7,200 and £50,000 in legal fees before the first witness is even called
Britain has built a parallel justice system that operates less as an escape valve for the courts and more as an industrialised grievance machine, a new Centre for Policy Studies paper argues.
‘Suffocated by Tribunals’, written by Alan Hibben and Robert Colvile, shows how misaligned incentives, overly broad legislation and the expanding reach of human rights law have created a system where the rational response for employers and public bodies is to settle, regardless of whether a claim has merit.
Judges themselves repeatedly describe proceedings before them as pointless or disproportionate. The paper highlights several ludicrous examples, such as a service charge dispute reduced by just £400 after costs running to many multiples of that sum; a taxpayer awarded £1 in costs after a full hearing; and 30 years of complaints and FOI litigation over a personal grievance, at no cost to the requester at any stage.
The SEND appeals are perhaps the starkest example. Cases have risen from around 3,500 a year in 2015/16 to nearly 24,000 in 2024/25. Councils contest them and lose almost every time, spending tens of millions of pounds on litigation rather than provision.
Then there are pay claims: under the ‘equal value’ doctrine, tribunals assess job worth through a bizarre points system with little reference to what the market will pay. Supercharged by no win, no fee litigation, this has already cost Birmingham and Glasgow approximately £1.3 billion each and is now working through every major retailer.
The report proposes six solutions, including modest means-tested fees for lodging tribunal complaints; a default costs rule for parties who push on past a clear warning; a proportionality gate to prevent processes exceeding the sum in dispute; and separating SEND diagnosis from automatic statutory entitlement.
Alan Hibben, CPA, CFA, said:
‘The United Kingdom is struggling with a very large productivity gap as well as the effects of a huge regulatory overburden. A poorly performing tribunal system adds to the inefficiencies of the economic environment and pulls scarce resources and human capital from more productive use.’
Robert Colvile, Director of the Centre for Policy Studies, said:
‘The tribunal system now processes cases under more than 80 statutes that either mandate or create a right of recourse to a tribunal or arbitral body, stretching across swathes of the economy. The examples in this paper show that it is not serving its fundamental purpose of bringing swift, proportionate and common-sense justice, while avoiding expensive legal proceedings – largely because the incentives across the system are so unbalanced.’
NOTES TO EDITORS
- ‘Suffocated by Tribunals’ is available here
- For more information or media requests, please contact Emma Revell on emma@cps.org.uk or 07912 485655 or Melisa Tourt on 07399 251110 or melisa@cps.org.uk
- The Centre for Policy Studies is one of the oldest and most influential think tanks in Westminster. With a focus on taxation, economic growth, housing, immigration, and energy abundance, its goal is to develop policies that widen enterprise, ownership and opportunity
Date Added: Wednesday 17th June 2026
