Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what estimate the Government has made of the cost to the Ministry of Justice budget of the increased number of litigants in person as a result of the means test threshold not being uprated in line with inflation in (a) civil legal aid since 2008 and (b) criminal legal aid since 2009.

We are currently reviewing the changes made to legal aid as part of the Post-Implementation Review of the Legal Aid, Sentencing, and Punishment of Offenders (LASPO) Act 2012 and have engaged with over 80 organisations as part of the evidence gathering process. We will use all the evidence we receive as part of our wider work to establish how best we can empower people to resolve their problems in a modern justice system.

Unrepresented parties have always been a feature of the civil and family justice system. Since 2015, the Government has invested £5 million of funding to support litigants in person through a range of measures designed to provide additional information, support and guidance.