The employment tribunal backlog has reached a new record, with the latest Ministry of Justice figures showing 70,000 single claims outstanding at the end of June 2026.
In Brief
The Employment Tribunal backlog has reached a record high, with 70,000 single claims outstanding at the end of June 2026. New single claims are arriving significantly faster than they are being resolved, while some longer hearings are now being listed into 2028 and 2029. Further employment law reforms due from October 2026 and January 2027 are expected to place additional pressure on the system.
Key Points
- The Employment Tribunal backlog reached 70,000 open single claims at the end of June 2026, the highest level in the published Ministry of Justice time series.
- Between April and June 2026, tribunals received 14,000 single claims but disposed of only 6,100, with receipts up 28% year-on-year and disposals down 6%.
- The open single-claim caseload increased by 51% compared with the same quarter a year earlier, showing that the backlog is continuing to grow rather than stabilise.
- Some longer Employment Tribunal hearings are already being listed into 2028 and 2029, with waiting times varying significantly between regions.
- From October 2026, the time limit for most Employment Tribunal claims will increase from three months to six months, while the unfair dismissal qualifying period is due to fall from two years to six months in January 2027.
- The Government is seeking to increase judicial capacity through sitting day allocations, remote hearings and recruitment of new Employment Judges, but the backlog is unlikely to reduce unless case disposals begin to catch up with new claims.
Between April and June, Employment Tribunals received 14,000 new single claims but disposed of only 6,100. The open single-claim caseload consequently rose by 51% compared with the same quarter a year earlier and has now reached its highest level in the published time series.
The figures underline the growing pressure on the Employment Tribunal system. The backlog is already at record levels at a time when further employment law reforms are expected to increase demand.
Employment Tribunal Backlog Reaches 70,000 Single Claims
Employment Tribunals received approximately 25,000 claims between April and June 2026.
Of these, 14,000 were single claims brought by individual claimants. A further 11,000 were multiple claims grouped within approximately 500 lead multiple cases.
The most striking figure is the single-claim backlog. At the end of June there were:
- 70,000 open single claims;
- 14,000 single claims received during the quarter; and
- only 6,100 single claims disposed of.
Single claim receipts increased by 28% compared with April to June 2025, while disposals fell by 6%. With considerably more claims entering the system than leaving it, the open caseload increased by 51% year-on-year.
The Ministry of Justice describes the 70,000 outstanding single claims as the highest level in the published time series.
The figures continue a trend we highlighted earlier this year when the employment tribunal backlog was approaching 60,000 single claims. The latest data suggests that the pressure has intensified rather than stabilised.
How Multiple Claims Affect the Employment Tribunal Backlog
The headline figures for multiple claims require more care.
There were 11,000 multiple claim receipts during the quarter, contained within 500 lead multiple cases. Employment Tribunals disposed of 4,100 multiple claims, while 467,000 remained open at the end of June.
However, 467,000 open multiple claims does not mean there are 467,000 separate tribunal proceedings progressing independently through the system.
Multiple claims can involve large numbers of individual claimants linked to the same dispute or employer. At the end of June there were approximately 7,600 open lead multiple cases covering those 467,000 individual claims.
This distinction is important because multiple-claim figures can be highly volatile. A single large equal pay or collective dispute can add or remove many thousands of claims from the statistics at once.
Combining single and multiple claims produces an overall figure of approximately 537,000 open Employment Tribunal claims at the end of June 2026. That figure accurately reflects the number of claims recorded as outstanding, but it should not be treated as 537,000 separate cases progressing independently. For assessing the underlying backlog from individual disputes, the 70,000 single-claim caseload is the clearer measure.
Employment Tribunal Backlog Pushes Hearings Into 2028 and 2029
The growing backlog is already translating into lengthy waits.
In a Parliamentary answer published in July 2026, the Government stated that the average period from receipt of an Employment Tribunal claim to disposal was 59.6 weeks as of April.
Most regions were still able to list one and two-day hearings during 2026. Longer cases present a different picture, with the Government confirming that some regions were already listing hearings into 2028 and 2029.
More recent reports suggest that the delays can be even more pronounced in individual cases. Employment lawyers have reported some hearings outside London being listed as far ahead as December 2029, while other claims continue to reach a hearing within months.
The precise waiting time will depend on factors including the tribunal region, complexity of the claim, anticipated hearing length and judicial availability. Nevertheless, the backlog means some parties may wait three years or more for a final hearing, creating obvious difficulties for both claimants and respondents.
Memories fade, employees and managers leave organisations, witnesses become more difficult to trace and documentary evidence becomes harder to reconstruct. A dispute can also remain unresolved long after the employment relationship itself has ended.
Further Pressure From Employment Law Reforms
The latest increase predates two significant reforms which are expected to increase access to Employment Tribunals.
From 1 October 2026, the time limit for bringing the majority of Employment Tribunal claims will increase from three months to six months. The new period will generally apply where the relevant workplace event occurs on or after that date.
A further major change takes effect from 1 January 2027, when the qualifying period for ordinary unfair dismissal protection will fall from two years to six months. The existing cap on compensatory awards for unfair dismissal will also be removed.
These reforms did not cause the increase recorded between April and June 2026 because neither had yet taken effect. Their significance is instead what they may mean for a tribunal system already dealing with a record backlog.
The Government's own economic analysis of the Employment Rights Act 2025 estimates that the reforms could result in an overall increase of around 17% in cases entering the individual enforcement system.
That analysis currently anticipates approximately 21,000 additional Acas Early Conciliation notifications, around 6,900 additional Employment Tribunal cases and approximately 1,300 additional cases requiring judicial time.
The reduction in the unfair dismissal qualifying period is expected to make the largest individual contribution, with the Government estimating around 3,000 additional Employment Tribunal claims from that reform alone.
Those estimates remain subject to change as further measures are implemented, but they illustrate the scale of the additional demand that could add further pressure to the backlog.
Is AI Also Affecting Employment Tribunal Claims?
There have been suggestions that easier access to information about workplace rights, including through generative AI, may also be making it easier for individuals to identify potential claims and prepare Employment Tribunal documents.
That possibility should not be overstated.
The Government confirmed in March 2026 that some stakeholders had reported potential claimants using generative AI to assess the apparent strength of claims or help draft tribunal documents. However, it has not carried out a formal assessment of whether generative AI is contributing to the increase in Employment Tribunal cases.
AI may therefore be changing how some claims are identified or presented, but there is currently insufficient evidence to treat it as an established cause of the backlog.
Regional Differences in Employment Tribunal Waiting Times
Employment Tribunal delays are not evenly distributed.
London and the South East have historically experienced particularly severe pressures, especially for lengthy discrimination and whistleblowing hearings. However, the backlog is no longer confined to the areas traditionally associated with the longest delays, with reports of substantial waits elsewhere in the country as well.
The Government confirmed in July that waiting times for longer hearings vary geographically and that some regions are listing cases into 2028 and 2029.
This matters because access to justice should not depend materially on where an employee happened to work or where proceedings are administered.
There will always be legitimate differences between cases: a ten-day discrimination claim cannot be listed as easily as a straightforward one-day wages dispute. The concern arises where comparable claims experience markedly different waiting periods because of regional capacity.
Government Measures to Reduce the Employment Tribunal Backlog
The Government acknowledges that the Employment Tribunal backlog is placing the system under significant pressure and has announced a number of measures intended to increase capacity.
Employment Tribunals have a baseline allocation of 32,590 judicial sitting days for 2026/27. A virtual region also allows remote hearings to be listed without geographical restriction and enables around 2,000 sitting days each year.
Following the latest recruitment exercise, 34 salaried Employment Judges are due to begin sitting from September 2026. Recruitment is also underway for a further 55 salaried Employment Judges, who are expected to add capacity from summer 2027.
The Government is additionally using Legal Officers to manage cases, developing modern case-management systems and continuing the use of remote hearings.
These measures should increase capacity. The difficulty is the scale of the existing gap between incoming and completed cases. During the latest quarter, the Employment Tribunal received 14,000 single claims while disposing of only 6,100.
Unless that gap narrows, additional judicial capacity may slow the growth of the backlog without immediately reducing it.
Employment Tribunal Data Quality
There is one qualification to the headline figures.
Employment Tribunals moved to the Employment Case Management system during March to May 2021. Data from the legacy and reformed systems has subsequently been combined, with amalgamated totals being used from the second quarter of 2025/26.
The Ministry of Justice says an earlier temporary reporting solution resulted in some overcounting of receipts and the open caseload. That particular issue has been addressed, although a wider data-quality review remains in progress.
The Ministry currently estimates that the open caseload may still contain an overcount of approximately 3% for single claims and lead multiple cases.
That caveat is important when interpreting the precise backlog figure, although the Ministry of Justice itself nevertheless identifies the current 70,000 single-claim open caseload as the highest level in its time series.
Employment Tribunal Delays: What This Means in Practice
For employees, long delays can mean waiting years for a dispute concerning dismissal, discrimination, whistleblowing or unpaid wages to be resolved. The delay may prolong financial uncertainty and make it harder to move on from the underlying workplace dispute.
Employers face a different set of problems.
A claim listed several years into the future may outlast the involvement of the managers who made the relevant decisions. Witnesses may leave, records become harder to locate and management time continues to be spent on a dispute long after the events giving rise to it.
The backlog therefore makes early evidence preservation increasingly important. Employers facing a potential claim should ensure relevant emails, documents, personnel records and contemporaneous notes are retained and that key witnesses can be identified while events remain relatively fresh.
The backlog may also change the commercial assessment of settlement. Even where an employer believes it has a strong defence, the management time, legal costs and uncertainty associated with several years of litigation may justify exploring early resolution.
That does not mean claims should automatically be settled. It does mean that the timetable has become an increasingly important part of litigation strategy.
Employment Tribunal Backlog: What Happens Next?
The latest statistics confirm that the Employment Tribunal backlog is now a central challenge for the system.
The open caseload of 70,000 single claims is a record. Single-claim receipts increased by 28% year-on-year while disposals fell by 6%, meaning the backlog will continue to grow unless the gap between incoming and completed cases narrows.
At the same time, significant employment law reforms are about to widen access to the tribunal system. Longer limitation periods take effect in October 2026, followed by the reduction in the unfair dismissal qualifying period in January 2027.
The Government is recruiting additional judges, expanding remote capacity and investing in case management. Those measures are necessary, but the latest figures demonstrate the scale of the challenge.
For employers and employees alike, the key issue is no longer simply whether a claim can be brought or defended successfully. Increasingly, it is also how long the parties will have to wait for the Employment Tribunal to determine it.
Employers: What This Means
The Employment Tribunal backlog means employers may have to manage claims for much longer before they reach a final hearing. That increases the importance of preserving evidence, maintaining clear records and assessing litigation strategy early, particularly where key witnesses or managers may leave the business before the case is heard.
- Preserve relevant documents, emails, personnel records and contemporaneous notes as soon as a dispute arises, rather than waiting until proceedings are well advanced.
- Identify key witnesses early and record an account of their recollection while events remain relatively fresh, particularly where a hearing may not take place for several years.
- Factor the backlog into litigation strategy. Even where an employer considers its defence strong, prolonged proceedings can increase management time, legal costs and commercial uncertainty.
- Keep settlement under review throughout the case. Early resolution may be commercially sensible in some disputes, but the decision should reflect the merits, likely costs and the practical impact of a lengthy tribunal timetable.
