Court Language Services Forum

The Justice Committee has launched an inquiry into the provision of interpretation and translation services since Applied Language Solutions (ALS) began operating as the Ministry of Justice's sole contractor for language services in February 2012. The Committee had an excellent response to its call for written evidence. We have been given many examples which highlight apparent under-performance but most of these have been provided by third parties and relate to the first few months of operation.

The Justice Committee has heard that some stakeholders may be reticent to provide formal written evidence. These may include: court and tribunal service staff; members of the judiciary and magistracy; legal practitioners and other practitioners; defendants in criminal cases and parties in civil and family cases and interpreters providing services on behalf of ALS. We would encourage these individuals to submit their experiences through this web forum using an anonymous user name.

The Justice Committee would like to hear from individuals with direct experience of the provision of interpreting and translation services by Applied Language Solutions (ALS). The Justice Committee would particularly like to hear about direct examples of recent performance issues (during September and October 2012) surrounding the operation of the Framework Agreement between the Ministry of Justice and ALS.

Comments will be pre-moderated before being posted on this web forum. Comments will be moderated at least every working day. Where possible we will aim to publish accepted posts within 24 hours. This forum is pre-moderated and comments that breach the online discussion rules will not be posted. Please avoid naming particular courts or court cases. Any such responses may not be posted on the forum by moderators. This forum will close on 2 November 2012.

Justice Committee