Report comment

I agree this is of no surprise. I act for a local authority. In the area of housing disrepair, which the article mentions, when legal aid was available for stand-alone disrepair problems, I never had any claims actually issued at court. Repairs were carried out quickly and where appropriate tenants apologised to and compensated. Now that legal aid has gone, the claims farmers have moved in (all based in Liverpool for some reason!) and are issuing right left and centre. They appear to advise their clients not to allow landlords in to do repairs to preserve the claim for specific performance. Result: tenant has to wait up to and over 1 year before any repairs are done, court time is taken up and thousands of pounds of public money is spent defending claims because of the eye-watering amount of costs claimed by the solicitors. Everyone loses out, apart from the solicitors acting in these claims.