HMCTS operational summary for week commencing Monday 25 April 2022

Next week’s update will be issued on Friday 29 April 2022.

• Updated: We published further updates to our information on COVID-19 following updated guidance in Scotland and Wales. We’ve relaxed many of the restrictions that were in place across our court and tribunal buildings during the pandemic.
• Updated: Courts will continue working at full capacity to speed up justice as the cap on sitting days is lifted for another year.
• Updated: Court and tribunal judgments are now freely available from The National Archives.
• Reminder: We published our updated Vulnerability Action Plan.

Crime

• Reminder: Common Platform is now live in 11 additional criminal courts in Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire. See the full list of participating courts where Common Platform is in use.
• Reminder: We published guidance for defence professionals on how to use Common Platform, and guidance for organisational administrators at legal firms and chambers on creating user accounts, assigning roles, and other system tasks.
• Reminder: Defence solicitors and barristers attending court for a Common Platform hearing should use the professional check-in feature, in both the Crown and magistrates’ courts.
• Reminder: If you have a Common Platform account, you need to login at least once every 90 days to keep it active. If your account is inactive for 90 days, it will be deregistered for security reasons. If you are deregistered, ask your organisation administrator to re-register you.

Family

• Updated: MyHMCTS has been updated to fix a known issue that meant divorce cases were not visible on solicitors’ dashboards. The issue is now resolved so you can progress and assign cases as usual.
• Updated: We published guidance videos to outline the steps a user should take to submit a contested financial remedy application and how a user can organise payments for their applications on our YouTube channel.
• Reminder: We hosted a webinar for legal professionals to demonstrate our new online divorce service. A recording of the session is now available to watch on our YouTube channel.
• Reminder: Our updated online divorce service went live on Wednesday 6 April 2022. The service includes changes as a result of the Divorce, Dissolution and Separation Act 2020, which reforms the legal requirements and process for divorce.

Judicial guidance and announcements

• For the latest practice directions, advice, and guidance please visit the Judicial Office website.