Countdown to judgement day over contracts

Sue Allen on how reluctant solicitors may scupper crime timetable

Criminal contracting will undoubtedly continue to dominate the horizon of publicly funded work this year.

Although redrafted contracts arrived on solicitors' desks before Christmas, the real crux will come when firms are asked to sign on the dotted line - scheduled for early February.

On 26 January, the consultation period on remuneration rates and pay structures will end.

There are no additional funds and the consultation is looking at redistributing existing funds.

If criminal solicitors are to get their first pay rise since 1992, then any additional money will come from the Lord Chancellor's Department, not from the Legal Services Commission.

Any decision to increase the budget will have to be soon if the commission is to have time to amend rates before April.

What would derail the timetable would be firms refusing to sign the contract.

At the end of last year, Law Society President Michael Napier wrote to firms urging them not to sign until the contracts were thought to be 'fair and workable'.

Rodney Warren, chairman of the Society's access to justice working party, has stated, often and loudly, that sticking to the timetable is not the concern of practitioners.

'We, as lawyers, don't give a damn about the timetable, if there is going to be a new working arrangement, it has got to be done fairly and properly, however long that takes,' he said recently.Richard Collins, head of the commission's criminal defence services, concedes that although the decision on dates rests with the government, the commission would have to make a judgement on whether or not to ask firms to sign if it looked as if many were going to refuse.'It is highly unlikely that we will send out the contracts if they are not going to be signed,' he says, adding: 'I still feel that it is all deliverable and that we have already come a long way.' Next year will also see the introduction of individual contracting in high-cost cases - those with costs above 150,000 or likely to last more than 25 days in the Crown Court.

A rolling-out of contracting for Crown Court work is scheduled for 2003.

A further seismic shift in the practice of criminal law will also come when the Salaried Defence Service comes into being.

The commission hopes that its first three pilot offices will be running by April.

Six offices are planned for the full four-year pilot.

Although other practice areas will be less affected by changes to public funding this year, the final part of last year's civil legal aid overhaul will also take effect in April when all remaining work will come under contracts for fully certificated work.