Judicial review applications fell 16% in 2020: report

The number of applications for judicial review fell 16% in 2020 to 2,800, data from National Statistics has revealed.

The Civil Justice Statistics Quarterly: January to March 2021 – published last week – also revealed that there were 610 judicial review applications received in the first quarter of 2021, down 23% on the same period in 2020.

Of the 610 applications received from January to March 2021, 240 were civil immigration and asylum applications, 350 were civil (other), and 30 were criminal, down 21%, down 23% and down 43% respectively on the same period of 2020.

A quarter of these applications from January to March 2021 (24%) are now closed. Of the total applications, 140 reached the permission stage in 2021, and of these:

• 8% (11) were found to be totally without merit (TWM).
• 43 cases were granted permission to proceed and 86 were refused at the permission stage. However, three of the cases refused at permission stage went on to be granted permission at the renewal stage.
• 46 of the 2021 cases have been assessed to be eligible for a final hearing and of these, 8 have since been heard.
• For the 2021 cases, the mean time from a case being lodged to the permission decision was 35 days, slightly down from 36 days across the same period of 2020.

The Civil Justice Statistics Quarterly: January to March 2021 noted that the Home Office was the department/body with the largest number of JR applications lodged against it, with 200 applications. Of these, 16 were granted permission to proceed to final hearing (8% of applications) to date.

Local authorities were the second largest recipient of JR cases, with 150 cases received. Of these, to date 26 have been granted permission to proceed to final hearing (17% of applications).

The third largest recipient was Ministry of Justice, having 120 applications lodged against it. Of these, none were granted permission to proceed to final hearing to date.