On 21 February 2024 we submitted our response to the Ministry of Justice's Review of Civil Legal Aid Call for Evidence. Our response provides a detailed explanation of the myriad issues undermining the ability of legal aid practitioners to meet the needs of clients. In particular, we focused on the following key, overarching issues: [...]
In recent weeks we have been working with a group of experienced legal aid lawyers to try to get a better understanding of what appears to be a growing and pressing problem: the apparent ‘culture of refusal’ within the LAA. We have agreed that to gauge the extent of this issue we need a [...]
Dr Marie Burton, within her PhD thesis: Calling for Justice: Comparing telephone and face-to-face advice in social welfare Law (LSE, 2016), has found that: There are significant consequences of replacing face-to-face advice with telephone advice in social welfare law. These consequences can seriously disadvantage many social welfare clients, particularly those who are more vulnerable and [...]