Criminal legal aid lawyers hit the streets of London yesterday to protest at the government’s plans to introduce price competitive tendering (PCT) and to cut fees. Protesters attended a demonstration outside parliament before moving on to attend a meeting near …

The Lord Chancellor, Chris Grayling, tries to justify the latest round of proposed legal aid cuts by arguing that expenditure under the last government ‘spiralled out of control’  (see the introduction to Transforming legal aid: delivering a credible and efficient system, …

At a meeting yesterday morning in London, the legal aid minister, Lord McNally, defended the government’s plans to introduce competitive tendering for criminal legal aid. While he said that the government would consider any responses to the consultation paper published on 9 …

It seems Justice Secretary, Chris Grayling, has managed to unite every lawyer and firm working in the criminal justice system against his proposals for competitive tendering for criminal cases. The suggested tendering system, which includes giving clients no choice of …

A raft of secondary legislation has been going through parliament in recent weeks to implement the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders (LASPO) Act. Yesterday, the last day the House of Lords was sitting before the Easter break, the final …

It was clear from the meeting of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Legal Aid yesterday evening that there is a wide gulf between legal aid practitioners and the government on the issue of competitive tendering for criminal legal aid services. …

  Lord McNally, the minister with responsibility for legal aid, has announced a decision to ‘accelerate’ the timetable to introduce competitive tendering for criminal legal aid. The government wants to save cash, but LAG asks can it succeed where the last …

The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) has issued its first set of documents on the new guidance and rules for claiming legal aid from 1 April. Included in the documents is the Lord Chancellor’s guidance on claiming legal aid in exceptional cases.   …

In a recent speech to the Resolution Foundation think tank, Citizens Advice CEO Gillian Guy highlighted the plight of the many people who are in work, but who make up 40 per cent of the 2 million face-to-face clients seen by citizens advice bureaux each …

Outspoken comments about the cost of defence advocates by the Justice Secretary Chris Grayling have been raised by LAG with justice minister Lord McNally. He said his boss ‘liked to pop balloons’ to get attention and added: ‘What Chris is trying to do is …