Opponents of the government’s legal aid reforms suffered defeats in two votes last night as peers continued to debate the controversial Legal Aid Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders (LASPO) bill.
In the third sitting of the bill’s report stage, the government defeated amendments that would have retained public funding for all immigration matters and for debt cases. As currently drafted the bill permits legal aid only for asylum immigration matters and removes funding for debt advice.
The government won the vote on immigration by 198 votes to 179, despite peers on all sides of the house speaking in favour of the amendment. Crossbencher Lord Pannick said the cut is proceeding on the basis of a ‘fundamental misapprehension’ that such cases are routine, which he said they are not.
Lady Butler-Sloss warned that the bill undermines international treaty obligations in respect of individuals trafficked into the country. Unless they are claiming asylum, she said, they will be deported without being able to receive the advice that they require.
For the government, Lord Wallace of Tankerness said the change would require the government to look again at its funding rationale at a time of limited resources. He argued that the bill already retained in scope asylum, detention and most judicial review cases, as well as funding advice through the Salvation Army.
Tankerness agreed to return to the house with amendments dealing with advice for trafficking victims. The second amendment, to retain funding for debt cases was defeated by 194 votes to 151.
Justice minister Lord McNally told the house that additional funding had been given to Citizens Advice to provide debt advice and that advice was also available from other sources.
The victories for the government followed six defeats suffered last week. The fourth sitting of the report stage will be tomorrow when peers are expected to debate and press for votes on amendments to retain other areas of law within scope as well as the litigation funding reforms in part 2 of the bill.
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