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Five things we can (usefully) do about LASPO
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No-one expected it to be good news. Even so the
preliminary findings of the Bar Council’s survey on the impact of the Legal Aid Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO) make for demoralising reading.
65% of family law barristers said they undertake less legal aid work since April last year with only 17% stating that the implementation of the Act had not affected their practice. 69% reported a reduction in their fee income. The number of family practitioners attesting to an increase in litigants in person exceeded even gloomy pre-LASPO predictions at 88% and 80% of responses indicated an increase of delay in the family courts.
The Child Arrangements Programme envisages a more ‘inquisitorial’ court process functioning effectively in the post LASPO environment and the
Money Arrangements Programme may well follow suit. However the result may in fact be a costly fudge of inquisitorial and adversarial systems: judges lengthily discharging their newly-expanded duties ...
Read the full article here.
