Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, if he will make an assessment of the potential merits of applying the so-called escape fee to the Civil Legal Advice scheme to ensure that advisers are paid above the fixed fees that apply where costs exceed the national fixed fee by a multiplier of three, in line with other parts of the Legal Aid system.

There is already an escape fee built into the payment mechanism for the Civil Legal Advice (CLA) scheme. For Discrimination and Special Education Needs cases that fee is set by the service provider, submitted as part of their contract bid and for Family and Housing the LAA set that price at £46 per hour.