Curran: Unambitious and tepid response
Four leading legal advice charities have expressed their dismay at the government’s failure to accept a single recommendation from the justice select committee on improving the legal aid system.
We reported yesterday that the committee was “deeply concerned” about the government’s approach to legal aid, as articulated in the response to its damning 80-page report published in July.
MPs said that of the report’s 28 recommendations, “we interpret the government as having either rejected or declined to comment on all of them”.
Law Centres Network, AdviceUK, AdviceNow and Manchester Justice Hub gave evidence together to the committee’s inquiry into access to justice, and in a joint statement said they shared the committee’s finding that legal aid was “a service in managed decline”.
They went on: “The government has not accepted a single one of the 28 recommendations the committee made to begin repairing it…
“Those recommendations, on eligibility, fees, provider capacity and scope, were a practical plan for recovery. Every day, our members and partners meet people whose problems with housing, benefits, debt or employment could have been resolved early with the right advice and legal assistance, and who instead reach crisis point.
“The government says it will explore reforms later, but restoring access to justice needs more than promises.”
The groups noted that last week’s Budget created a new ringfenced budget for prevention – which fitted the description of free legal advice and assistance.
“The spending review is the opportunity to act now: restoring legal aid as a practical route to justice and making sure everyone can get advice and legal assistance early, wherever they live.
“We stand ready to work with the government and the committee to make that happen.”
Another campaigner, Dr Liz Curran, professor of justice reform and legal innovation at Nottingham Law School, said she too was disappointed by the Ministry of Justice’s “unambitious and tepid response” to the committee’s report.
“Despite the wealth of evidence and practical solutions available, its response does little to address the fundamental problems facing the legal aid and legal support system… This is another wasted opportunity to take meaningful action to help the millions of people with unmet legal need.”
Dr Curran also gave evidence to the committee, drawing on the law school’s report last year, Regulatory Leadership on Access to Justice, which was commissioned by the Legal Services Consumer Panel in collaboration with the Legal Services Board.
She said there was a range of tested solutions and opportunities for the government, including stronger ethical regimes, improvements to publicly funded legal services and “encouraging pro bono through the use of the government’s own levers”.
The academic highlighted that the committee had accepted that legal aid was not simply a market, and that a market response was no longer enough.
“It is this reductionist framing as a ‘market’ that has enabled over decades, the shrinking of the discussion to being about savings and expenditure, ignoring that access to justice is essential for ‘equality before the law’, a fundamental tenet of the rule of law, for a functioning democracy…
“Seeing the current state of the legal services and representation as a market has seen a failure to strategically consider and understand the consequential implications of austerity.”
A Ministry of Justice spokesman said: “Legal aid is a vital public service that helps vulnerable people access justice.
“We inherited a legal aid system in crisis. That’s why we are investing £116m per year more for criminal legal aid solicitors’ fees, £34m per year for advocates, and £20m per year in the civil sectors.
“We recognise that there’s still more to do and we are committed to working with the committee to further improve the system.”
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