Looking for an oasis

JANET PARASKEVA LAMENTS THE EMERGENCE OF LEGAL AID DESERTS AND OUTLINES A STRATEGY TO STOKE INTEREST IN THIS CRITICAL AREA OF PRACTICE

In last week's Daily Telegraph, Joshua Rozenburg interviewed a Cambridgeshire solicitor from the town of March.

This lawyer was, he reported, the only solicitor franchised to do criminal legal aid work for the 50,000 people living in March and the surrounding area.

Stories such as these, repeated up and down the country, highlight the crisis facing legal aid.

Law Society research last year demonstrated the emergence of these 'deserts' of provision, where groups of people were becoming excluded from access to legal advice.

The time has now come to open a properly considered debate on the future of legal aid.

Access to legal advice and representation for all those who need it is a hallmark of a free and democratic society.

It ranks along with health and education as a critical public service.

However, the current system of publicly funded legal services falls far short of the ideal, and government policy on funding is making the current outlook on access to justice quite bleak.

The Law Society has embarked on a wide-ranging debate, engaging practitioners from across England and Wales on how best to tackle these difficulties and deliver the best possible services to those in need.

Solicitors involved will play a crucial role in formulating the Society's policy for the future, by focusing on questions raised in a consultation paper which examines a number of options and possibilities.

The consultation is aimed at practitioners in private practice, employed solicitors and those working in the not-for-profit sector.

There is also a need to engage government and the Legal Services Commission in designing the future of publicly funded work.

Having launched a consultation paper drawn up by the Society's representation board, we are now staging a series of roadshows over the next few months, around England and Wales to provide a forum for debating the issue.

Meetings have already taken place in London, Taunton, Cardiff and Newcastle.

The discussions are identifying real fears among solicitors involved in delivering publicly funded work through private partnerships as they are finding it harder and harder to make it pay.

But some are finding innovative ways through the system to ensure that all clients get access to justice whether or not they can afford it.

Representing the wide range of views is going to be difficult.

Stark differences of opinion have already emerged.

But what is clear is that something has to be done - and done soon before even more experienced practitioners leave this area of work or young people entering the profession are further deterred.

The aim of this consultation is not merely to consider whether the current scheme could be developed along its present lines, but to explore whether there are alternative models of provision that would be more successful while operating within a cash limited budget.

If the legal aid scheme was being set up from scratch today, it is unlikely that the model of delivering services almost entirely through private practice would be followed, as it is certainly not common in other jurisdictions.

The government needs to be persuaded both to maximise funding for legal aid, as a crucial public service, and to consider innovative ways of ensuring the best use of the resources that are available.

But however desirable additional funding might be, concentrating solely on that will not necessarily help address the challenges presented by the existing system or government policies that do not at present properly value legal aid.

Therefore, the debate needs to focus on the key issue of how access to justice can be provided, even within the current budgetary parameters, to those who cannot afford to pay for the services of the legal profession when they need them.

The shared goal of the government, the Legal Services Commission and the Law Society is surely an effective, high quality, value-for-money service for the socially excluded.

A key element in achieving this is a policy that ensures that quality lawyers are attracted to the work and are motivated by it.

And access to justice is the most important issue of all.

Everyone in society should have access to legal advice when they need it and there should be a wide choice of solicitors available, providing good quality service located reasonably locally.

Achieving this balance is something of a conundrum.

But the consultation is already suggesting some possible solutions.

Meanwhile, the Society continues to press the government to recognise the gaping hole made in the legal aid budget by the urgent need for immigration support - a need that was not identified when the budget was set - and by Home Office policies that have significantly affected criminal court costs.

The profession too needs to think laterally about the future of publicly funded work - and to consider changing its style of practice quite radically.

And at the very least, the government has a duty to balance the financial equation it has disrupted.

- Road show dates and venues are as follows: High Wycombe (26 March); Cambridge (1 April); Leicester (8 April); Manchester (29 April); Leeds (6 May); Chester (13 May); London (19/20 May); Winchester (17 June); Plymouth (26 June).

More dates may be added.

Janet Paraskeva is the Law Society's chief executive