The Department for Constitutional Affairs (DCA) is having some success in making other government departments aware of how their policies impact on the public funding budget, the legal aid minister has said.


Writing in this week's Gazette, David Lammy admitted that talks with practitioners over the fundamental legal aid review - expected to report early next year - had left the DCA struggling to address high levels of frustration over a perceived lack of long-term aims from the government, as well as 'cumbersome contracts and frequent changes of policies and procedures'.



But on an optimistic note, he added: 'What makes the review genuinely fundamental is that we are starting to bring out the relationship between legal aid and other parts of government.' The criminal justice system and public bodies on the civil side would be particular targets for clamping down on wasted expenditure, he said.



Richard Miller, director of the Legal Aid Practitioners Group, said it was encouraged by the fundamental review's recognition that the causes of many of the pressures on the legal aid budget were external to the system. 'However, what is missing at the moment is any recognition of the extent to which inadequate remuneration is responsible for the massive drop in the number of new legal help cases taken on by solicitors over the past two years,' Mr Miller warned. 'If this is not addressed, the system will continue to shrink regardless of the many worthwhile new initiatives coming out of the review.'



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