Provision of community legal services

Many solicitors will know that access to certain kinds of Community Legal Service advice in some areas is limited, generally in the more remote rural areas.

This means that the public in these areas has no real access to legal advice.

The Legal Services Commission (LSC) has a public duty to ensure access to community legal services within its allocated resources.

The LSC decided to provide, in these gap areas, access to limited legal help through telephone services.

In 2001, an open invitation to tender was issued.

Organisations were asked to bid to provide services in specified categories of law in one or more of the gap areas.

Those areas were identified both geographically and by category of law through a process that involved the regional legal services committees on which local solicitors are represented.

This resulted in 12 contracts being let to firms of solicitors and not-for-profit providers on a regional basis.

There were no private practice bids to provide a national service, but a commercial call-centre provider, Capita Assistance, did bid to provide a service in all identified areas.

A contract has been concluded with Capita for several of the areas, and telephone lines are now open.

The contract provides that solicitors employed by Capita will give advice and assistance - under a legal help contract - in specified geographical areas and categories of law where a gap has been identified.

The service will be marketed by the LSC as part of the Community Legal Service in the relevant areas.

The employed solicitors' code allows solicitors to provide telephone legal advice while employed by a commercial telephone advice service.

However, that advice is limited in the code to telephone advice and one written reply.

The proposed legal help contract between the LSC and Capita necessarily requires solicitors employed by Capita to provide more assistance than this.

However, the conduct of litigation and advocacy does not form part of the contract.

Therefore, the Law Society has granted a waiver of the relevant rule to solicitors employed by Capita.

The Society concluded that such a waiver was necessary in the public interest in those areas where there are identifiable gaps in access to community legal services.

The case is distinguishable from that of other commercial providers as Capita will only be providing publicly funded services in identified areas of unmet need, in furtherance of the statutory duties of the LSC.

The waiver is subject to a number of conditions and there are certain review requirements.