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Carter Review

With permission, I wish to make a statement about the publication of Lord Carter of Coles’s Review of Legal Aid Procurement, following a statement by my noble Friend the Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs in the other place earlier today. Copies of Lord Carter’s review have been placed in the Printed Paper Office, the Vote Office and the Libraries of both Houses. A joint consultation paper on his proposals has been issued simultaneously by the Department for Constitutional Affairs and the Legal Services Commission, copies of which have also been placed in the Printed Paper Office, the Vote Office and the Libraries. Lord Carter’s report is the product of a year of engagement between a number of stakeholders. Government, the Legal Services Commission, the Law Society, the Bar Council and the judiciary, individual practitioners and others all played a full part in the discussions that led to his recommendations. In his report, Lord Carter identified the importance of publicly funded legal services to ensuring proper access to justice for those in need of advice and representation, and for those who are charged with criminal offences. He rightly refers to the high quality of our legal system. At a time of finite public resources and ever-increasing pressure on the legal system, it is vital that we review our arrangements for the provision of legal aid. For some time, under successive Governments, they have not fully served either the public or the clients of the system. Changing the way in which we purchase legal advice services is a key element of our desire to reform the criminal justice system and provide better outcomes in civil and family justice. I know from experience the difficulty of balancing all the competing factors to ensure that legal aid is fair to the vulnerable, fair to taxpayers, fair to defendants and fair to practitioners. Lord Carter concluded that there must be a fundamental change in the way in which legal aid services are procured, so that clients have access to good-quality legal advice and representation, so that a good-quality, efficient supplier base thrives and remains sustainable, so that the taxpayer and the Government receive value for money, and so that the justice system is more efficient, effective and simple. He recommends a new system for the provision of criminal legal aid in which the professions ensure proper quality control over their members and lawyers are as far as possible paid on the basis of completion of a case rather than according to the number of hours for which they have worked, and are encouraged to be as efficient as possible by being able to compete for work on the basis of price. Lord Carter proposes that the criminal legal aid market should be restructured and suggests a timetable. April 2007 should see the introduction of a new fixed fee scheme in police stations. It should also see changes to standard fees for magistrates court cases, changes to the advocates’ graduated fee scheme in the Crown Court and an extension of the graduated-fee scheme to litigators in the Crown Court. For very high-cost cases, the Legal Services Commission should introduce an enhanced quality threshold and use a higher level of in-house expertise and closer management to secure greater control over the individual case contracting regime. Lord Carter proposes that that be achieved by the end of the financial year 2007-08 through the LSC contracting solely with a panel of suppliers. Panel membership would be determined through demonstration of an appropriate enhanced level of quality, as well as through competition. Price competition should be introduced in 2009, with quality assured suppliers bidding for multiple units of cases in police stations which they would usually take to the magistrates courts and/or Crown Courts. The transition to a more market-based approach comes alongside changes to the regulation of legal services, as outlined in the draft Legal Services Bill. Taken together, those developments will mean change for the profession—a degree of restructuring for solicitors and barristers alike. The changes must be managed in a way that ensures continuing quality and choice for the public, while giving the professions time and, if necessary, support to adjust to the new model. Lord Carter recognises the need to ensure that providers of legal services continue to serve black and minority ethnic communities and those in less densely populated and rural areas. He strongly acknowledges that one size does not fit all, and makes detailed proposals to ensure the continued improved provision of high-quality legal services for all those communities. His report contains detailed recommendations that will help us to devise the criminal justice system that the public expect: one that is simple and speedy, and makes the best use of summary justice. For civil and family legal aid, the report provides for a more efficient, client-focused service, concentrating on meeting different local needs. Lord Carter suggests that that will be achieved through the establishment of community legal advice centres and community legal advice networks, which is in line with the Legal Services Commission’s strategy for community legal services. Best value tendering for the new centres and participation in the networks should begin in 2009. New forms of contracting are expected to promote greater links between civil suppliers and, where possible, greater links with family law suppliers, so that clusters of problems can be dealt with earlier and more effectively to avoid the risk that they multiply and lead to people falling into the social exclusion trap. The Legal Services Commission also proposes to move to fixed and graduated fees from April 2007 for a wide variety of civil and family work, and also for most immigration work. That will promote and reward the most effective working by suppliers. The consultation document published alongside Lord Carter’s report contains full details. Lord Carter estimates that if the reforms had been fully in place in 2005-06, criminal legal aid spending would have been £100 million lower, and that does not take account of the potential further savings from best value tendering. In addition, there would have been a greater proportion of legal aid spent on civil and family matters. By the end of the implementation period, because the reforms will also control unit costs far better than many elements of the current scheme, spending will be lower than it would be without the changes proposed. I also welcome and accept Lord Carter’s recommendation for better management and control of spending, including through greater transparency and shared problem-solving between the DCA, the LSC, other Departments and the professions. In conclusion, the Government strongly welcome Lord Carter’s findings and we have today issued a consultation paper to which I encourage everyone to respond. I look forward to the challenges that are ahead and working with all stakeholders and the Legal Services Commission, the dedication and commitment of whose commissioners and staff will be critical to success. I am immensely grateful to Lord Carter for the work that he has done.