The coronavirus lockdown has highlighted the hardships faced by Cumbria’s most disadvantaged residents in accessing justice, national campaigners have said.

Since the lockdown was put in place on March 23, as many civil court cases as possible have been conducted online.

However this has caused problems for the country’s most disadvantaged people according to legal campaigners, who have said that virtual hearings should not be a long-term set-up due to fears that the cost of internet access may prohibit some from accessing the justice system.

Serious and urgent civil court cases have been held in courts where a hearing over a video link or over the phone was impossible, but others - including cases over the guardianship of children - have been conducted remotely.

Edward Cooke, from national family law group Resolution, said: “We are deeply concerned that the Government may, in the face of budgetary pressures from other areas, make deep, further cuts to face-to-face court provision.”

The Equality and Human Rights Commission stated in April that it had concerns that the long-term use of video hearings would put people with learning disabilities, autism spectrum disorders or mental health conditions at a particular disadvantage, due to the particular challenges they may face in accessing justice in this way.

An HM Courts and Tribunals Service spokesperson said that judges would continue to take into account the needs of those participating when considering the “best way for a hearing to take place. It said: “We continue to work closely with the judiciary to use technology and keep the justice system running during this pandemic.”

Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, family law group Resolution said its members reported substantial problems of vulnerable people accessing courts and having to travel increasingly long distances to have their cases heard.

A new analysis from the BBC Shared Data Unit has shown the average distance people have to travel in order to get to court, and how that has changed since the closure of a number of courts.

Cases which were until 2011 heard in Whitehaven Magistrates’ Court were now heard in the West Cumbria Magistrates Court in Workington.

That has left people with an average increase in distance to travel from 3.44 miles to 9.13 miles.