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Judge won’t make directions and won’t put this in writing
I know what you mean about it being interchangable but I’m not sure thats the end of it. I’ve never read the decision just notes about what it said but if it only said that the overall resources of the SSWP and the amount of stuff on his plate is relevant then I don’t think that necessarily means he can justify under resourcing appeals. Producing a response ought to be easy peasy in most cases. You have to set out the reasons for the decision - well you should know what they are youve just made it. You have to produce the evidence used - well youve just used it. Yet it can take up to a year to do this whereas the comparatively more difficult and time consuming process of gathering evidence and making a decision that someone is not entitled can be done in a few weeks. Like I said I never read that decision so this might be a non starter but the idea that appeal responses can’t be produced more quickly is pretty clearly rubbish, they’ve just decided to put their resources into disallowing benefit and take them away from people being able to challenge it when they do.
The FTT rules probably do change things. Didn’t an earlier draft give them 42 days but in the end they thought they’d need a little bit longer!
I recently requested a direction from TTS to the DWP to issue the appeal bundle for an ESA (WCA failure) after the appeal was lodged 13 months before. TTS issued a direction requesting said bundle within 21 days with a warning that the Department could be precluded from further participation or having the case decided against it if it failed to comply. Lo and behold bundle produced in 6 days.
One of the points I raised in my request was that a long delay would be prejudicial to my client as, come the hearing, as he had to give evidence as to how he was at the date of the decision, the further back in time that was the more difficult the recall would be. Lengthy delays in producing ESA bundles are increasing here but how lengthy the delay has to be before becoming unreasonable will be decided differently by different tribunal judges I suppose.
Update. Medical evidence submitted. Decision revised. Unnecessary delay and stress caused to client.