Civil consultation
Consultation on LSC Unified Contract and General Criminal Contract
Legal aid: a sustainable future
Consultation on proposed amendments to the Funding Code Procedures
Consultation on proposed amendments to the General Civil Contract
Consultation on the reform of the LSC’s Applications and Appeals Procedures
Quality Relationships Delivering Quality Outcomes: The Preferred Supplier Scheme Consultation
Consultation on amendments to the General Civil and General Criminal Contracts from April 2006
Consultation on LSC Unified Contract and General Criminal Contract
This consultation closed on Tuesday 21 November 2006.
In our consultation paper 'Legal Aid: a sustainable future' (published July 2006) we put forward a number of proposals concerning legal aid contracts from 1 April 2007.
In that paper, we said that we wished to introduce a Unified Contract on 1 April 2007, which would cover civil legal aid from that date (as the current General Civil Contracts expire on 31 March 2007).
The LSC has consulted with professional bodies on the terms of the Unified Contract. The final version of the Unified Contract includes changes resulting from the consultation process and will come into force on 1 April 2007.
A post-consultation report is available in 'The Unified Contract: Review of responses to the consultation' under Related Documents. It provides:
- A background to the report
- A summary of the responses to the draft contract clauses.
General Criminal Contracts will extend, automatically, from 1 April 2007 to 31 March 2008. However, we wanted to make some changes to the General Criminal Contract Standard Terms from 1 April 2007 and, in accordance with the terms of the General Criminal Contract, have sent a consultation paper 'General Criminal Contract Information and Standard Terms Amendments 1 April 2007' to The Law Society, setting out our proposals for consultation.
The consultation has closed and the outcome is now available from CDS > Recent Consultations.
To make it easier for current holders of our contracts, we have also published three tables with notes of the main differences between the proposed Unified Contract and the current General Civil Contracts and a question and answer document on the more important issue:
- LSC Unified Contract Notes on Policy Amendments
- LSC Unified Contract Notes on Housekeeping Amendments
- LSC Unified Contract Notes on Amendments to the Specification
- LSC Unified Contract Q&A.
All documents are under the Related Documents panel.
Legal aid: a sustainable future
Lord Carter has published his independent review into legal aid procurement, which the Department for Constitutional Affairs (DCA) commissioned in July 2005 as part of A Fairer Deal for Legal Aid.
The Review sets out a programme of reforms to achieve a market based system which will change the way the Government buys legal advice on behalf of the public.
Lord Falconer, Lord Chancellor and Secretary of State for Constitutional Affairs and the Legal Services Commission (LSC) have responded to the Carter Report with a formal joint consultation paper, Legal Aid: a sustainable future, which reflects Lord Carter's recommendations.
Please note there is an error in the regional fees tables for 'Family Help - Private' and in the fee table for 'Care proceedings Graduated Fee Scheme'.
The Proposed family fees: presentation helps explain the calculation of the proposed fees for Public and Private Law Family.
Consultation on proposed amendments to the Funding Code Procedures
This consultation closed on Friday 28 July 2006.
We are considering a range of amendments to the Code procedures for October 2006. These amendments would give effect to the proposed reforms of our Applications and Appeals Procedures on which we are already consulting.
The draft amendments also cover other matters such as reflecting recent organisation changes in our regional offices and simplification of Part B of the Procedures, which covers Controlled Work.
The paper explaining the various proposed changes and the amendments themselves shown with revision marks are under Related Documents.
Because the provisions of Part B of the Procedures overlap with parts of the General Civil Contract Specification, there are separate documents showing the consequential amendments to the contract flowing from amendment of Part B and reform of our committees.
Consultation on proposed amendments to the General Civil Contract
Post Consultation Summary Report: Perfomance Indicator for CLR
We have published the post-consultation report on this consultation, which was in relation to the proposal to introduce a performance indicator for Controlled Legal Representation.
The post-consulation report covers:
- the background to this report
- the submissions received
- a summary of responses to the consultation
The report is under Related Documents. Details of contract amendments are on the Immigration and Asylum pages.
Consultation on the reform of the LSC’s Applications and Appeals Procedures
This consultation closed on 28 July 2006.
Having considered the consultation responses we have decided to proceed with the reform package for implementation on 2 October 2006.
Full details of the consultation responses and the LSC's decision can be found in our response to the consultation responses under Related Documents.
Contract Notices in relation to the relevant contract changes will be issued shortly.
Quality Relationships Delivering Quality Outcomes: The Preferred Supplier Scheme Consultation
The LSC launched a 12-week consultation on its proposals for a national Preferred Supplier scheme on 20 March 2006 which will run until 12 June 2006.
The consultation paper is available from the Related Documents menu on the right hand side of this page. All organisations currently holding a legal aid contract will receive a copy by post.
Responses are welcome from individual practitioners as well as professional bodies. Please send responses by email, post or fax at the earliest opportunity to:
Preferred Supplier Consultation Response
Legal Services Commission
85 Gray’s Inn Road
London WC1X 8TX
DX 450 Lon/Chancery Lane
Fax number: 020 7759 0534
Email: preferred.supplier@legalservices.gov.uk
If you email your response to us, which we would encourage, please put the words ‘Consultation response’ in the subject heading of the email.
Please send your consultation response once only as this will make it easier for us to compile and monitor responses. We will acknowledge receipt of all responses by post or email within a week.
A series of consultation events will be held across England and Wales throughout the consultation period. For further details of these events and for further information on the proposed scheme, please visit the Preferred Supplier pages on this site.
For general enquiries about the consultation, email the Preferred Supplier team.
Consultation on amendments to the General Criminal and General Civil Contracts from April 2006
The LSC has consulted with professional bodies on proposed amendments to the General Criminal Contract and General Civil Contracts. Changes resulting from the consultation will come into force on 17 May 2006.
The outcome of consultation document is available on the Criminal Consultation section of this site.
Controlled Legal Representation: A Consultation on the Proposed Amendments to the General Civil Contract Relating to Immigration and Asylum Work
This paper sets out the LSC’s intention to amend the General Civil Contract and to introduce a performance standard for Controlled Legal Representation (CLR).
It was first presented at a meeting of Immigration Stakeholders at our London Regional Office on 11 October 2005. Since then, we have given further consideration to the proposals.
Please find the following documents in the Related Documents section on the right of this page:
- Letter to Stakeholders dated 7 March 2006
- CLR Consultation document
The deadline for responses is 28 March 2006.
How to respond:
Emma Warran
Immigration Services Team
Legal Services Commission
12 Roger Street
London WC1N 2JL
Tel: 020 7759 1471
Fax: 020 7759 1469
Email: immigration.services@legalservices.gov.uk
Last updated: 05 December 2005