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Legal Aid

It would depend on the category of case. The case cited by the hon. Gentleman sounds like a very high-cost one. I did not note that item in the debate pack. A very high-cost case would already be completely outside the fixed fee system; subject to a contract link with the Legal Services Commission, a supervisor would supervise it and all the work necessary would have to be screened through the LSC beforehand so that it could be established that it was necessary for the good conduct of the case. That is how the hon. Gentleman’s example sounds to me. The other cases that will come out of the fixed fee system will be those that are complex and will take much longer than could realistically be paid for on a fixed fee. That will happen more in London, where there are more complex cases—about 10 per cent. of cases in London are categorised as complex, compared with about 2 per cent. nationwide. Such cases must be dealt with on an hourly rate because of their complexity.