"The new policy will be extended later this year to cover sub-£10,000 claims submitted through the Online Civil Money Claims service....Mediators will not be asked to say whether parties had engaged adequately in the process – attendance will be all that is needed to meet the obligation....The most recent Ministry of Justice (MoJ) figures, for the last quarter of 2023, show that it took an average of 55.8 weeks between a small claim being issued and the claim going to trial, 4.3 weeks longer than the same period in 2022 and the highest since it began publishing figures in 2009. These figures do not include cases resolved through mediation."
