[Neil Jones]

I wonder if they basically see Neighbours as the Judge Judy of the UK in terms of profile, you’d think the later would be more expensive but I’d imagine she’s on much more than the Neighbours cast combined for a start.

Well Judge Judy was relatively quick to make, as they could do an entire season's worth of material in IIRC something ridiculously short like 50 filming days a year, and I wouldn't be surprised if the Judy Justice spin-off is just as quick to make, though apparently she is on significantly less money (half as much) than on the Judge Judy programme.

Something like Neighbours will be more expensive to make, as those sort of productions need a bigger team to pull it off (and knock out the 200 episodes reported by the DS article).