Legal Aid Bill: The Media Whitewash

Whilst the government is getting a well deserved thrashing in relation to the proposed assault on the NHS, and the Welfare Reforms, there is much less noise and also much less support in the media in relation to the Legal Aid Bill currently making its way through Parliament. Bearing in mind that the Bill involves the issue of legal fees it is unsurprising that the majority of people at best don’t know and/or don’t care about this issue, as not only is it a dry and seemingly removed subject from our everyday lives, but also as the image of lawyers is historically so negative in the media.

I would hazard a guess that the large majority of the British public who have come into contact with lawyers at some point or another would no doubt admit that their solicitor was perfectly agreeable and even did a good job. However, there is still an underlying urban myth promoted by the media that lawyers are somehow slightly tawdry and only out for their own interests. I am sure that there are such lawyers out there, but the same could be said of any group of people in any walk of life. Read more »

The Legal Aid Bill – Everyone Affected

At the centre of these changes are the proposed changes to how no win no fee agreements operate. Simply, this allows a Client to enter into an agreement with a lawyer or legal team that if they don’t win the case there will be no charge to them but if they are successful the costs incurred by their legal team will be recovered from the other side. Therefore, these no win no fee agreements are backed by policies of insurance to cover the Opponents’ costs if the Client loses.

John Prescott is right; Part 2 of the Legal Aid Bill (“the Bill”) as proposed is going to affect a lot of people. Widely published as dealing what are said to be excessive costs in personal injury cases, the Bill as drafted has wide ranging consequences for any individual or company looking at bringing a case of any sort in the civil courts.

There have been a number of suggestions surrounding the Bill of what should happen with these agreements. These include the banning of being able to recover insurance premiums from a losing Opponent, Defendants not being able to recover their legal costs if they are successful (except in certain cases where the Claimants’ case was very weak) and an increase in damages of around 10% to partly pay for these costs. Read more »