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Legal Aid (Northern Ireland) Order 2005

My Lords, I am grateful for the supportive comments. The order—which is in effect transitional—is coming forward only because of the remarks of the judge in the case which I referred to earlier, who said that things were unsatisfactory and something needed to be done. Work is going on to bring in the full Monty, if I can put it that way, of the procedures that have already gone through the House, but it is necessary to do this now for lots of purposes. As I said, it would be wrong of me to speculate about particular cases, although I have only referred to one by name and title. As I also said, the Lord Chancellor would have to look first of all at any determination from the commission, because that is where the applications would need to be made. I assure the noble Baroness that in Northern Ireland at the present time there is no cap on the civil legal aid budget, so there is no cross-over between criminal and civil. There is ongoing reform of legal aid in Northern Ireland. Criminal remuneration is being reformed, and there is a programme of work in hand to reform civil remuneration as well. That said, all I can say to the noble Lord and the noble Baroness is, thank you very much for the support. On Question, Motion agreed to.