HM Courts and Tribunals Service has spent more than £400m on agency staff in the last five years, a justice minister has revealed.

HMCTS spent £224m on agency staff between 2017/18 and 2019/20 before its annual outlay jumped by 16% to £91m in 2020/21, despite just a 1.5% increase in agency staff numbers from 2,141 to 2,174 – based on the average number of full-time equivalent agency staff.

In response to a written question from shadow justice secretary Steve Reed, James Cartlidge said HMCTS estimates that it has spent a further £88.7m on 2,332 agency staff in 2021/22, bringing the five-year total cost of agency workers to £404.1m.

However, the minister said the figures for the most recent financial year are ‘draft numbers’ pending the National Audit Office’s audit of its annual report and accounts.

The executive body’s last annual report for the year to 31 March 2021 show that its total staff costs for 2020/21 were £625m – of which £397m related to wages and salaries, not including agency staff costs – up by 8% from £576.2m in 2019/20.

A HMCTS spokesperson said: ‘Temporary frontline staff helped us keep the justice system moving during the pandemic and have provided much needed expertise and flexibility as we modernise our court and tribunal service as part of our £1.3bn reform programme.’

Cartlidge’s response follows his answer last week which revealed that the Ministry of Justice spent just over £36m on management consultants in the last three years, more than £6m of which was in relation to HMCTS.

The agency has also paid £111m for a seven-story office building next to the Old Bailey which will host a new tribunal centre in London and, up to the end of March 2021, had spent £236m on implementing the Common Platform programme.