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Family Conciliation Services

Answer

The Ministry of Justice incurs costs in cases involving child contact issues in respect of legal aid and the administration of the courts.Table 1 shows the highest, lowest and average legal aid cost in cases involving child contact for each of the last five years. These cases may include other issues, such as residence, as well as contact. The figures show the gross legal costs paid, and do not deduct any amounts recovered through contributions by the assisted party or otherwise.The figures in table 2 show the average court cost for private law Children Act cases heard in the family proceedings courts and county courts for the four years since 2005-06. The costs shown are gross and do not deduct income from court fees.It is not possible to disaggregate court costs in a way that would allow them to be attributed to individual cases. Therefore, figures for the highest and lowest case cost cannot be provided.

Table 1
£
	Highest cost	Lowest cost	Average cost
2004-05	122,360	10	2,532
2005-06	184,735	10	2,769
2006-07	140,985	14	3,229
2007-08	188,236	11	3,437
2008-09	232,508	10	3,176

Table 2
	£
	Average costs
	Family proceedings court	County court
2005-06	¹893	¹1,126
2006-07	²1,183	¹1,259
2007-08	²1,346	¹1,212
2008-09	²1,941	¹1,092
¹ A11 private law Children Act cases including, contact, residence, parental responsibility and financial provision. ² Contact and residence only.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

506 c790-2W; 318042

Session

2009-10

Subjects

Contact orders Family conciliation services

Contains statistics

Yes

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk