More than seven months after announcing £34m to bolster the barrister workforce within the criminal legal aid sector, the government has finally announced how it plans to carve up the cash.
The Ministry of Justice announced last December that £34m would be injected into criminal advocate fees (£92m was separately announced for solicitors).
Opening a consultation today, the department said barristers would receive an average fee increase of 11%, ‘recognising their vital role in delivering justice and supporting efforts to tackle court delays’.
Barristers will receive a general 6% uplift, supplemented by further targeted increases. For instance, fees for appeals from the magistrates’ courts and in the Court of Appeal will rise by a further 10%. Advocate fees for plea and trial preparation hearings will rise by a further 25%.
The basic fee for a guilty plea is currently set at 50% of the basic fee for a trial or cracked trial – this will rise to 65%. ‘Based on the evidence available to us, this adjustment supports earlier and more thorough consideration of cases and may lead to more cases being resolved at an earlier stage, where appropriate, contributing to a more efficient court system,’ the consultation document says.
Offences such as rape and serious sexual offences, serious violence, and burglary and robbery will attract higher basic fees.
Justice minister Sarah Sackman MP said: ‘Victims deserve to see justice delivered without unnecessary delay. That's why we are investing up to £34m a year in criminal legal aid, supporting the barristers who keep cases moving through the courts and help ensure offenders are brought to justice. This investment will strengthen the legal aid sector, enable more cases to be heard and help cut the court backlog, ensuring victims receive swifter justice.’
Bar chair Kirsty Brimelow said: ‘Whilst our representations on the allocation of the legal aid increase were made in January, we will reconsider the current proposals to ensure that the targeted increases are appropriately directed. Above all, the system cannot endure where increases only come into effect on cases that complete years in the future. They must apply to current cases.’
Brimelow thanked Sackman ‘for finally moving the announcement of an increase to criminal legal aid to a consultation and acknowledge the government’s truncated consultation period, as urged by the Bar Council’.
The consultation closes on 26 August.
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