Pro bono no substitute for legal aid - Wotton
Lawyers need to do more to bridge the gaps in access to justice caused by legal aid reforms, the Law Society president told an international conference in Russia. However he stressed that pro bono work is no substitute for a properly funded legal aid system.
John Wotton, speaking at a forum attended by the justice secretary Kenneth Clarke, said the legal aid cuts in England & Wales, made in the Legal Aid Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act, pose challenges in ensuring that the most vulnerable can obtain legal advice.
Wotton said the act, which removes large areas of civil law from public funding, means that lawyers will need to do more pro bono work.
‘We need to involve more stakeholders, both within the profession and outside, to find new ways of bridging the access to justice gap which has been created by the LASPO,’ he said.
Wotton said pro bono work not only provides people with the legal help they might otherwise not get, but helps develop solicitors skills, boost morale, enhance recruitment and retention, and helps firms win business from clients who expect their suppliers to support the community.
He pointed to Law Society research which indicated last year solicitors did an average of 55 hours pro bono work, which based on charge-out rate is valued at £518m - the equivalent of 2.4% of gross fee income.
‘Pro bono is an important element in the provision of access to justice, with a long and venerable tradition that benefits the public and the profession,’ he said. But he stressed that it should only be an ‘adjunct and not a substitute for a properly funded legal aid system’.
Wotton highlighted the series of debates that will be hosted by the Law Society on the theme of Protecting Access to Justice in a post-LASPO World.
They aim to bring together potential funders, voluntary organisations and lawyers to find the best and most innovative ways of ensuring that the most vulnerable members of society are not left unprotected and unrepresented.
The event in Russia provided an opportunity for representatives of the Law Society, Bar Council and UK government to press the benefits of London’s legal, arbitration and mediation services.
Comments
LEGAL AID WOULDNT BE NECESSARY IF
It would appear that the entire legal profession has kept their head in the sand, causing their own demise, and still dont get it. Legal Aid was presumably created for people who couldnt afford the extremely high hourly rate charged by Solicitors and Barristers. Why should the taxpayer subsidise the legal profession? - that is a question that no-one in the 'profession[, huge as it is, has answered yet.
Its a pretty good question. Well, of course, the answer is, the taxpayer shouldnt have to subsidise the legal profession. The legal profession should not be subsidised, and ordinary individuals should always be able to easily afford good Solicitors and Barristers.
Easy solution. Become proper competitive businesses, with proper marketing and advertising plans, hire good accountants, learn how to treat your clients well, charge a very competitive rate, say £65ph, and price yourselves into the market.
Legal aid would then become history, but for the very few, the economy healthier and we, the consumer, happier!
DO YOUR HOMEWORK NICOLA MATHESON-DURRANT
Why don't you look into how much it costs the government to provide a criminal defence service for example, namely the public defender service. It far exceeds the costs of private practice. That's the only reason the CDS has not been abolished. The same applies to in-house advocates for the CPS and the use of the more cost efficient self-employed bar.
Amongst other reasons, that is because private practitioners don't charge for anything else involved in running a business, providing services or staff perks.
If you do the math, publicly funded lawyers are remunerated to the equivalent of chicken feed, and certainly less that £65ph, GROSS. Is that not competitive? What is more, do you really think clients of legal aid lawyers can afford £65ph. That's what they get in JSA to live off for the entire week.
The public think that legal aid lawyers take home £180ph, each and every working hour of the week. WRONG. As for the city, that is the result of free-market competition. Nice? You fool.
Legal aid is the hallmark of a civilized society, one that respects the good administration of justice, the rule of law and equality of arms. Take a rain check naive little lady. Have some dignity for the love of god.
what cds said
It's incredible someone can be as out of touch as Nicola. She must have never actually done legal aid work or perhaps any pro bono. Most of my clients were living off JSA or Income Support of £67.50 per week, some even less than that. An hour's advice at Matheson-Durrant LLP and they wouldn't eat or have any heating or electricity for the rest of the week. And as the client's issue was often the refusal, stoppage or overpayment of their housing benefit, it was often more important to get the rent met and avoid imminent eviction than than spunk their entire week's income on a hurried hour's advice. How ever much you may love the free market, it won't work here Nicky. It's like trying to scrap third world aid, suggesting that third world nations pay for competitively priced goods - perhaps via some kind of hire purchase scheme - then pitching it as some kind of viable revenue stream! Unbelievable.
Legal aid and third world aid.
what cds said
Submitted by tom on Sat, 19/05/2012 - 08:52.
How ever much you may love the free market, it won't work here Nicky. It's like trying to scrap third world aid, suggesting that third world nations pay for competitively priced goods - perhaps via some kind of hire purchase scheme - then pitching it as some kind of viable revenue stream! Unbelievable.
.............................
I am not quite sure that is fair but you raise an interesting analogy between Legal Aid and Third World Aid.
Third World Aid is not just about giving handouts to the people in the affected countries. In the last few years much more effort has gone into developing schemes to help these people help themselves - so in the future they are no longer dependent on handouts
People in the Third World do not wish to be forever dependent on handouts and righfully so. Therefore why does the legal profession insist that handouts of taxpayers money continues with no sort of committment to look at other ways of funding?
Okay it wasn't a perfect
Okay it wasn't a perfect analogy, it was somewhat hyperbolic, but the point remains - you can't charge someone for something when they have no money.
Plus your extension of the analogy doesn't work either. Legal aid is, by definition, a hand out and will always be just that. Legal aid recipients arent a third world countries in the sense which you seem to suggest; they can't cease to be dependant by building their own legal infrastructure! As long as there are poor people, there will be a need for free legal advice funded by general taxation. It's a public service which ensures justice for the most needy. It's a part of a modern civilization, just like free education and free healthcare and social security.
In continuing to deny this, you strike me as either being some kind of right wing extremist or shockingly oblivious.
Dinosaur analogy
Tom
I don't disagree with everything you have said. If you read my original comments you will see that.(see below - the posts tend to get jumbled up) So suggesting I am a right extremist or oblivious is well wide of the mark.
I am merely suggesting that Nichola has raised some interesting points worthy of discussion. To dismiss those comments in the insulting way they have been perhaps suggests many here have closed their minds to more imaginative ways of funding or doing things.
Why is that and who is really being oblivious?
Some of the comments I have read on LSG lately are really similar to ones you might expect to read on a blog for the followers of Arthur Scargill. They are akin to the scaremongering you hear about the NHS. Anyone who dares suggest that taxpayers money should be spent wisely or has ideas on better ways of doing things gets accused of wishing to privatise it.
And if the analogy we discussed does not do it for you perhaps you can chew on this one, which is from a comment posted on another LSG article a few days ago....
'I am afraid you are dinosaurs and the asteroid has already hit'
I'll be honest - I thought
I'll be honest - I thought your reply was from Nicola again - hence the comment about her being a right wing/oblivious.
But moving on - to state that 'legal aid wouldn't be necessary if we charged competitive rates' is utter poppy-cock for the reasons explained. Nicola is not positing 'more imaginative ways of funding', she is positing one unimaginative way of funding which wouldn't work.
I'm all in favour of looking at how taxpayers money is spent and feel that legal aid was/is in need of reform, as was/is the welfare system as a whole. But Nicola is suggesting that tax payers don't need to fund legal aid at all!
Let's give the girl the credit she deserves here...
Legal aid in the real world
The last poster clearly has no idea why legal aid exists. How can someone who is on benefits relying on legal aid/legal help to stop an eviction, challenge a complex benefits decision, get help with a complex employment matter where they are in a low paid job, deal with complex debt claims, rely on a lawyer charging £65 per hour-that is not the real world.
The City firms need to stop pretending they are doing much by nominal pro bono such as providing the time of a few trainees or providing old desks and computers and start putting up some cash to keep law centres and legal advice centres with their specialist staff in operation. Money for running costs is what is needed, not tokenism.
Double-barrelled
Double-barrelled surname = daddy's paying for law school and I know not of this so called 'dole'.
Undertaking Pro-Bono should
Undertaking Pro-Bono should be made a serious disciplinary offence.
Only if NONE were undertaken would the Govt be forced to re-introduce a proper legal aid system.
City firms chirruping that they help out with housing repo cases once in a blue moon make me heartily sick...It provides a nauseating fig-leaf of respectability to cover up their otherwise grotesque earnings.
legal aid wouldn't be necessary
You're right we should all charge £65 an hour and maybe my firm's professional indemnity insurer will reduce the £38k they charged us this year despite the fact we have never ever had a claim made against us.
Maybe the LSC will pay us too when they take up so much of our time demanding to know the colour of skin of our latest client to be arrested for burglary at longsight police station before paying us £200 for attending there for 6 hours at 03.00hrs on christmas day.
Maybe we could be paid for our time attending their audits of our firms when they are looking to close us down and following any appeals we have to make on our own time we could claim costs from them if we win.
The rates of pay which remain unchanged for 20 years are perfectly sustainable because of there has been no inflation in this country for the same period which is a good thing otherwise the lack of rise will certainly have equated to a reduction.
At court this week at Crewe only one solicitor at a time could see his/her client over the video link facility and then in between solicitors seeing clients the court dealt with individual cases because the court could not produce a client for a hearing at the same time a solicitor saw a client over the link separately. I wasn't bothered though about the fact that this useless technology meant my cases which i could have dealt with in the past by midday actually took until 17.15 to complete because i am so keen that the government save money on police station to court transfers and so i gladly accumulated 4 hours of waiting because we get paid for waiting time don't we? - This was not a one off, they can only produce one person at a time over the link from the local police station.
Thinking about it now i really can't understand why anybody who attracts any private work at all needs to charge more than £65 per hour.
Of course the legal aid rates do not exceed £45.00, never mind the £65 suggested and our clients cant afford to pay otherwise they would.
Get real you idiot!
Legal aid debate
Submitted by Nicola Matheson-Durrant on Fri, 18/05/2012 - 17:39.
It would appear that the entire legal profession has kept their head in the sand, causing their own demise, and still dont get it. Legal Aid was presumably created for people who couldnt afford the extremely high hourly rate charged by Solicitors and Barristers. Why should the taxpayer subsidise the legal profession'?
Its a pretty good question. Well, of course, the answer is, the taxpayer shouldnt have to subsidise the legal profession. The legal profession should not be subsidised, and ordinary individuals should always be able to easily afford good Solicitors and Barristers.
Easy solution. Become proper competitive businesses, with proper marketing and advertising plans, hire good accountants, learn how to treat your clients well, charge a very competitive rate, say £65ph, and price yourselves into the market.
Legal aid would then become history, but for the very few, the economy healthier and we, the consumer, happier!
......................................................
I do have some sympathy with the above view to be honest. And let's be fair it is constructive and worthy of debate even if it appears simplistic. Personally I do not think that legal aid could end without disadvantaging the most vulnerable in society. But in my opinion the system needs a complete overhaul and some of burden taken away from the taxpayer. I am sure there are some imaginative ways this can be done without putting all the burden back on the legal profession.
From my own limited experience of seeing taxpayer funded litigation in action, to me it was a question of whether the legal aid/fee exempt system was fair or was being abused by vexatious litigants and other wasters to the detriment of those in genuine need of justice.
Seeing a case in the High Court a few years where 70 'bloggers' were pursued for internet libel (which was little more than an online spat) by a fee exempt individual, himself represented by a top 250 law firm did cause me to ask whether we had our priorities right. The case was dismissed early on as completely without merit but imagine my shock to see the claimant represented by the Pro Bono Unit a couple of years later in the Appeal Court, appealing the clearly hopeless cases.
Ironically the multiple defendants forced to answer these ludicrous allegations could not afford representation and did not qualify for legal aid because they were taxpayers - many on low incomes. The whole set of proceedings over 5 years (none even went to trial and it took this long) probably cost millions in fee exemption, hearings and court time.
So is it right that taxpayers who fund the system have to fund this abusive type of litigation made against hard working members of the public (i.e themselves) without any prospect of recovering their costs?
Is it right that the the obviously hopeless and expensive cases were bounced from one court to another for years without making a decisive decision far earlier?
The latter question is one of case management in libel cases but again is perhaps relevant to reform and saving money.
So I think the system needs to be reviewed to save money and ensure those who need legal aid most are getting it. Those who abuse the system for their own benefit should be stopped. I accept that my example is unusual and legal aid helps those with very basic and everyday essential needs but nevertheless I think it highlights the need to focus priorities in the system as a whole.
For things to change I think there has to be a shift in attitudes and a constructive mood of co-operation. So far, I have seen little evidence of that here.
Constructive mood of cooperatrion
Wait till someone sues you and you regard the claim as unmeritorious. My bet is that you're going to want your lawyer to do everything which he can properly can to defend you and make things difficult for the other side, not engage in constructive cooperation with them.
Suing Kelly Matthews
Me
I think you may have missed the point of my post or perhaps even the whole debate. My last paragraph was a summing up of my view on the article - not related to the example I gave.
Anyway - I have been threatened with being sued for libel several times. I do have access to a decent lawyer but as far as libel is concerned - I can manage quite well without him.
Not just direct funding
As a (mature) law student I have found its not just a lack of direct funding that will result in the demise of access to law for all. I don't want to be a corporate solicitor, I want to be a legal aid solicitor, which is, in reality, a pipe dream because there are very few firms offering seats in the legal aid sectors. Simply because they want high fee earners (understandably they want to see returns on the training).
I currently volunteer at the CAB, and if I don't find a training contract I can see myself staying there (hopefully) as a caseworker rather than selling out and going to a Manchester corporate firm.
Double standards
"For things to change I think there has to be a shift in attitudes and a constructive mood of co-operation. So far, I have seen little evidence of that here."
I have just been shown a letter written by Ms Matheson-Durrants proporting to be a McKenzie friend.
Sadly, I must inform all of you that it appears she does NOT practice what she preaches.
If only she had shown some inkling of "a constructive mood of co-operation" in the content and tone of her letter then perhaps many family issues could be dealt with without the need for unneccessary court applications and hence the need for legal aid.
Hi Carol Low, Given what has
Hi Carol Low,
Given what has been said on the thread about Stobart Law (section 12 Legal Service Act), and given the corrosive effect that these people have (do a search for "Dr Pelling" or "Elizabeth Watson") on constructive resolution of emotional family problems, you might want to raise the question of what her "Family Law Clinic" is doing, with either the judge, the SRA, or whomever.
Practising what she preaches?
I have just been moved to have a sniff around Ms Matheson-Durant's website. It seems she counsels against using expensive solicitors and barristers and offers to provide 'professional' McKenzie Friends for the bargain price of £95 per hour, plus expenses.
Shurely shome mishtake?
Family Law Clinic / Stobart
Ms Matheson-Durrant through the Family Law Clinic does appear to offer support services in family proceedings including McKenzie Friend services all for remuneration. Until I did a search just, perhaps naively, I didn’t realise that there were so many people charging to do such work and act as MFs.
High level judicial guidance was given in July 2010 and that guidance includes the following on remuneration:
27) Litigants can enter into lawful agreements to pay fees to MFs for the provision of reasonable assistance in court or out of court by, for instance, carrying out clerical or mechanical activities, such as photocopying documents, preparing bundles, delivering documents to opposing parties or the court, or the provision of legal advice in connection with court proceedings. Such fees cannot be lawfully recovered from the opposing party.
28) Fees said to be incurred by MFs for carrying out the conduct of litigation, where the court has not granted such a right, cannot lawfully be recovered from either the litigant for whom they carry out such work or the opposing party.
Earlier, it is emphasised:
18) MFs do not have a right of audience or a right to conduct litigation. It is a criminal offence to exercise rights of audience or to conduct litigation unless properly qualified and authorised to do so by an appropriate regulatory body or, in the case of an otherwise unqualified or unauthorised individual (i.e., a lay individual including a MF), the court grants such rights on a case-by-case basis.
19) Courts should be slow to grant any application from a litigant for a right of audience or a right to conduct litigation to any lay person, including a MF. This is because a person exercising such rights must ordinarily be properly trained, be under professional discipline (including an obligation to insure against liability for negligence) and be subject to an overriding duty to the court. These requirements are necessary for the protection of all parties to litigation and are essential to the proper administration of justice”.
The difference between Stobart and Family Law Centre is that the former are not openly offering a McKenzie Friend service which, of course, would not sit well with their model which centres on the involvement of direct access Barristers.
However, the time does seem to be right for some clear further guidance on just what it does involves to conduct litigation together with the associated issues raised on the other threads.
So
The guidance referred to above can be found on the judiciary.gov.uk website.
I'd be interested to know what advice Family Law Clinic gives to its clients about the recoverability of its fees. Of course, not being a firm of solicitors, FLC is presumably not under the same obligation as a solicitor to give best advice on costs and methods of funding. For £95 per hour on a matrimonial case, you could probably get a high street solicitor and (for hearings) a pupil or newly-called barrister.
I'd also like to know how franchisees of FLC get "lifetime professional indemnity insurance" (as the website states). I was not aware that any insurer offered such a thing. Who is the insurer, how much cover does it provide and on what terms?
Pro bono thread
We seem to be some distance from the original topic but to comment on "Me on Thu, 24/05/2012 - 01:04":
It may be that costs are not recovered in family proceedings as often as in other proceedings, but PI insurance is interesting.
My experience (which is not just limited to Solicitors’ PI insurance) is that "lifetime professional indemnity insurance" is not available. You take out annual policies while in practice and run off cover when you stop.
I do not know whether any organisation, which is mentioned on this thread or on other threads, is conducting litigation or not but, speaking generally, there must be a risk that a PI insurer would not respond to a claim arising from the conduct of litigation where the organisation involved is acting illegally.
Family Law Clinic
Hi Everyone
This thread has been most enlightening.
To clarify, Ms Matheson-Durrant letter on headed "Family Law Clinic Ltd" paper appears to misrepresent herself as a legal entity as in the letter she refers to " her Client" in seven paragraphs.
The letter is poorly written, contains veiled threats and is maleficent in its entirety.
She is clearly offering advice to and writing on behalf of her "clients" certainly not acting as a Mckenzie friend.
It seems her Family Law Clinic has over stepped the mark, exposing people who use her service and is relieving them of money that could be spent on gaining legal advice from a suitably qualified solicitor.
We are unsure how to take this matter further other than showing the Judge her disgraceful letter.
The letter will be kept as evidence should it be required in the future.
Enforcement
Carol
You might wish to follow this link to the SRA policy on this:
http://www.sra.org.uksolicitors/enforcement/we-are-investigating-you/criminal-prosecution.page
Alan Foster
Enforcement
Sorry this seems to be the link to the relevant SRA policy:
http://www.sra.org.uk/solicitors/enforcement/we-are-investigating-you/criminal-prosecution.page
Research on N M D
It's odd after seeing these posts I too have looked at other forums and found that Ms Durrant has posted on all manner of web sites (femail, wikivorce etc) lambasting the costly legal system and poo pooing the role of solicitors and barristers....
Like me many have commented on those forums that it is a thinly disguised attempt to promote her own services.
Others have commented that if Ms N D feels she is such an expert on law why has she not done the right thing and actually be a solicitor rather than seemingly be happy to indulge fantasies of being one without the responsibilities and therefore code of conduct that this entails.
I believe that solicitors play a vital role in the legal process and further have been party to many litigation procedures that have been resolved with their involvement AND not requiring extensive cost nor the use of the courts.
Ms N D is normally so keen to make her presence felt on forums, I'm sure she is aware of these comments but the "silence is deafening"
I concur contact the SRA they not only deal with errant solicitors etc (of which there are very few) but also with bogus "solicitors" who tarnish their good name AND to be honest many a McKenzie who whether their advice is as good or not offer the time and knowledge very cheaply if not free rather than Ms N D £95 + VAT