Legal Services Commission (LSC) plans to automate the merits test risk causing injustice, it was claimed this week.


A 'delivery agreement' from the Ministry of Justice - which spells out how it aims to make the £1 billion of 'value for money' savings required by the Treasury between 2008 and 2011 as part of the Comprehensive Spending Review - highlights LSC plans to introduce electronic working for means testing, merits testing and billing.



However, Criminal Law Solicitors Association director Rodney Warren said that while he fully supports applying IT to appropriate tasks, 'the whole point of the merits test is that is must be about justice'. This means each case should be assessed individually.



'To think you can simply run it through a computer is a simplistic and inappropriate approach,' he said.



An LSC spokesman said: 'The move to electronic working is vital in modernising and improving how the LSC does business and will bring benefits for clients, providers and the LSC.' She said it plans to publish a 'delivery transformation' consultation shortly.



Neil Rose