The Bar Council has urged the government to halt plans to regulate contingency fees, to allow time for greater public debate.

In its response to the Ministry of Justice’s consultation on regulating the damages-based agreements that are frequently used in employment cases, the council said proposed legislation should be delayed until after Lord Justice Jackson’s final report on civil litigation costs has been published in December.

The government plans to introduce provisions in the Coroners and Justice Bill, currently before parliament, to enable proper regulation of contingency fees. It claims this will protect vulnerable claimants from being ‘exploited’ by ‘no win, no fee’ lawyers who take large proportions of their client’s damages.

The council noted Jackson’s comment in his preliminary report that the unregulated use of contingency fee agreements is open to abuse. The bar’s representative body said concerns over consumer protection were justified.

However, the council added that ‘such a central issue should be subject to proper examination and consultation’.

Nick Bacon, a costs barrister leading the bar’s response to the consultation, said: ‘What is being proposed in the Coroners and Justice Bill as currently formulated is a wholesale reversal of the law against contingency fees. It is astonishing that such a fundamental shift in policy should not be preceded by wide and open public debate and consultation.’

‘The Bar Council is unable at this juncture to express a definitive view as to whether its membership would or would not support the abolition or even relaxation of the prohibition against the use of contingency fees in contentious and non-contentious business in the future,’ said Bacon.