Solicitors have this week warned the Legal Services Commission against reducing rates of pay for experts, amid concerns that they will refuse to testify in legally aided cases.

The Legal Aid Practitioners Group (LAPG) spoke out in its response to consultation from the LSC, which spent more than £130 million on experts in 2003/2004 and proposes caps on pay in civil matters. The scheme would give solicitors a lump sum for payments on account of disbursements, rather than having to make individual payments. There would be periodic reconciliation against actual claims.


LAPG said: ['We] support in principle the LSC's aims of improving the quality of experts used in publicly funded litigation and controlling the cost. However, we do have concerns that these aims are in tension. The LSC needs to be alert to the risk that if the controls on cost are too tight, or the quality assurance requirements too burdensome, experts will simply stop doing the work.'


Brian Thompson, secretary of the Expert Witness Institute, said: 'We support LAPG's view that current LSC rates are far too low and have left experts feeling disinclined to accept work on that basis. It is also a view very much endorsed by our members.'