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Year-2 LASPO: What next for family law?

© Copyright LexisNexis 2024. All rights reserved.
Date:14 APR 2014
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Marc Lopatin
Mediator

It's now been a year since the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) withdrew legal aid from lawyers for most private family law cases. So what are the repercussions for family law services?

Data from the MoJ and recent research from NAPO and Cafcass point to a clear surge in the number of self-litigants.

Prior to the Legal Aid Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders (LASPO) Act being implemented in April 2013 the MoJ reassured anyone listening that family mediation would take up the slack and keep families from the courts.

And what has happened? Well as litigants in person surged publicly funded mediation starts plummeted by over 40% between May and November 2013 compared to the same period in 2012. Meanwhile impacted lawyers turned their backs on mediation in favour of selling lower-cost unbundled parcels of advice.

It strikes me that no one is getting much out of this. For a start a great many litigants...

Read the full article here.

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