Legal Aid and Civil Costs Reform

Lord Thomas of Gresford Excerpts

Monday 15th November 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Thomas of Gresford]

My Lords, I cannot welcome the Statement, but I welcome the fact that the Minister has said that not principle but finance has caused the reductions that we have seen. When I read the Statement, I thought that the noble Lord, Lord Bach, could easily have issued a similar Statement in the previous Government. No doubt that is why his criticisms were so muted.

This is a considerable challenge to the legal world. Here I declare an interest as a practising criminal Silk, paid very often by legal aid. The suggested reforms set out in the Green Papers require very considerable attention from both the criminal Bar and the family Bar. It is the latter that will really suffer under the provisions that are being put forward.

I ask the Minister about the suggestion that there will be a new exceptional funding scheme for excluded cases. I had a number of discussions with the noble Lord, Lord Bach, when he was in the previous Government, on that very issue. Its importance is that it is wrong for an individual to be in a court, tribunal or inquest and to find himself facing a state-funded organisation such as the Army or the Air Force, or a well funded public company, when an allegation of negligence has arisen. The previous provisions for an exceptional funding scheme were largely concerned with inquests. The noble Lord, Lord Bach, will recall that it was not easy through that mechanism to obtain proper funding for families in distress who faced paid advocates at a very high level who were trying to make sure that their clients were not accused of any negligence. What is the new exceptional funding scheme? Will the mechanisms be improved? Will they be more apparent so that people understand how to obtain exceptional funding in the future? That is a very important issue and I hope that the Minister will be able to respond.

[Lord McNally]

I thank my noble friend. His question gives me the opportunity to mention a point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Bach, to which I did not respond. If not exactly ring-fenced, criminal legal aid is more protected because we take the view that when people are on trial for a criminal offence, it is important that they have access to justice and legal aid. However, that does not mean making a choice between criminal and civil cases, other than that, in terms of access to justice, a criminal charge is more serious.

The exceptional funding scheme will go wider than assistance for inquests, and it will indeed be available for those who may find themselves out of scope in these decisions but who have an exceptional case to make. I note what my noble friend says. We are well aware that we are making tough decisions that are needed to ensure access to public funding in cases that really require it and in protecting the most vulnerable in our society, as well as encouraging the efficient performance of our justice system. As we have made absolutely clear, those decisions are motivated partly by economic circumstances but also by a view that the legal aid system, as the noble Lord, Lord Bach, acknowledges, needs to be recalibrated and rebalanced, and that is what we have tried to do.