Government to review civil legal aid
The government announced a long-awaited review into the civil legal aid market in January. The review will commission an external economic analysis of the civil legal aid market to better understand how people access funding and support.
Encompassing all categories of civil legal aid provision, the review will include in-depth analyses of areas that include family, housing, mental health, education, discrimination and immigration. The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) said the review would also consider “value for taxpayers’ money of future policy options and take into account wider budgetary restraints on the department”.
As well as an assessment of how such systems work in other comparable countries, the review will also include publication of further data on how civil legal aid is accessed and delivered across England and Wales to help inform future decisions.
Justice minister Lord Bellamy said: “This comprehensive review will give us a wealth of evidence on the civil legal aid systems, how services are provided and of the issues facing the market. Identifying how we can make provision work best for everyone will help ensure we are building a more efficient and effective system to deliver sustainable legal aid support well into the future.
CILEX Chair Professor Chris Bones welcomed the review as “a positive opportunity to think creatively to solve the current sustainability issues that are facing civil legal aid”.
He said: “We look forward to taking part in a broad and collaborative approach to explore options that use all available business models and types of lawyers, including CILEX Lawyers, to build a more competent and sustainable system.”
The final report is due to be published in 2024. The Law Society described it as “long overdue” and argued there was “an urgent need for immediate investment in civil legal aid” while the review was going on.
President Lubna Shuja said: “Over the past decade, the number of legal aid firms has nearly halved, while the number of people struggling to represent themselves in the family courts has trebled and court backlogs are ever increasing.”