The Criminal Legal Aid Advisory Board has laid bare the crisis facing the sector, telling lord chancellor Shabana Mahmood that the situation has deteriorated in the three years since an independent review called for urgent action on fees to reverse the decline.
The 2021 Bellamy review recommended a minimum 15% fee uplift, but solicitors initially received only 9%. In a report published yesterday, the board said the effect of delay in implementing the review’s recommendations was further exacerbated by inflation and rises in the cost of living, to the extent that significant extra cash is now required to achieve the aims of the 2021 review. The board called for 'substantial immediate funding' above the 15% recommended by the 2021 review.
In a promising sign yesterday, Mahmood announced a £24m funding injection into police station and youth court fees - £3m more than proposed by the last government. Some £400,000 will be set aside to pay travel time in areas with fewer than two providers, the Isle of Wight and providers willing to travel from surrounding schemes.
The Ministry of Justice said the £24m ‘marks start of this government’s work to sustainability of the justice system both now and in future’.
The government has yet to announce its response to the High Court defeat suffered by its predecessor over the Bellamy recommendations following legal action brought by the Law Society. The board urged the lord chancellor to make a decision urgently which takes into account ‘the broader current picture of the continuing and increasing adverse impact on the sustainability of the work of criminal legal aid solicitors of the reduced 9% percentage uplift’ that was highlighted in evidence submitted to the court by the Society and practitioner groups.
The board added: ‘The lack of a decision on this fundamental issue impacts on the morale and trust of criminal legal aid solicitors, and is a significant impediment to progress by [the advisory board]. We advise that retrospective re-running of modelling on the efficacy of lower percentages than 15% when time and inflation have eaten away the value of the full [independent review] uplift is now inappropriate and insufficient, and a prospective approach is needed.'
The board backed the independent review’s call for the government to fund training grants. It called for RASSO (rape and serious sexual offences) fees to be immediately uplifted to address a shortage of advocates doing this specialist work.
It also called for an increase in prison law fees. However, the ministry has opted against this. The department said, in its response to the crime lower consultation, that it would keep the position under review but wanted to direct cash on the earlier stages of the criminal justice system as part of the 2021 review’s objective to encourage early engagement between the police, prosecution and defence.
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