The lord chancellor was today accused of lying over the criminal bar’s demands to expedite his response on criminal legal aid reform. The Criminal Bar Association has said it will ballot members on action if the lord chancellor does not commit by Monday to substantially increase funding.
In an article for The Times, Dominic Raab said rushing criminal legal aid reform would open the government up to legal challenges and result in further delays.
Raab said: ‘The association risks leading its members into an unnecessary and irresponsible strike against a process the government is duty-bound to follow, rather than the policy decisions we will be announcing in a matter of weeks. From the soundings I have taken, I do not believe that it carries support from the majority of those working across our justice system, who also want to see reform and proper remuneration for all practitioners.’
The CBA issued a robust response to Raab’s ‘misleading article’ on Twitter in a series of posts.
The association said the government has not been asked to infringe any public law principles. ‘This is a lie. We have asked for a response to a report MoJ commissioned, and have had since the end of November.’
The CBA has engaged with the criminal legal aid review process since before 2018. ‘We have been patient, and engaged, for nearly four years. Any suggestion to the contrary is a lie.’
It added: ‘We are not proposing strike action. This is a lie. We propose withdrawing labour on cases “returned to us” when counsel is no longer available due to work commitments i.e. where our hardworking and outstanding value for the taxpayer props up a system which only functions with us.’
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