Criminal consultation
Consultation on LSC Unified Contract and General Criminal Contract
Legal aid: a sustainable future
Criminal Proceedings in the Magistrates’ Court: Exceptional Funding On The Grounds Of Hardship
Consultation on the reform of the LSC’s Applications and Appeals Procedures
Outcome of Consultation - General Criminal and General Civil Contracts (April 2006)
Quality Relationships Delivering Quality Outcomes: The Preferred Supplier Scheme Consultation
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, 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.
Criminal Proceedings in the Magistrates’ Court: Exceptional Funding On The Grounds Of Hardship
This consultation closes on 17 August 2006.
The Criminal Defence Service Act 2006 received Royal Assent on 30 March 2006. It provides enabling powers to transfer responsibility for the grant of legal aid from the courts to the LSC, and to introduce a new means test for legal aid applicants.
The means test will be introduced for criminal proceedings in the magistrates’ court on 2 October 2006. The purpose of the Hardship Review is to allow legal aid applicants who fail the means test but believe that they are genuinely unable to pay for their defence costs to have their circumstances reviewed on the basis of whether they have sufficient means to afford the costs of their case.
We believe that the Hardship Review proposals will ensure that the resources made available to the legal aid fund are directed towards those in genuine financial need, and allocated in an efficient, consistent, transparent and fair way.
These proposals expand on the policy outlined in the ‘Criminal Defence Service Bill: Supplement to the Framework Document’ and the Criminal Defence Service Act Regulations published by the Department for Constitutional Affairs (DCA).
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.
Consultation on amendments to the General Criminal Contract from October 2006
The LSC has consulted with professional bodies on proposed amendments to the General Criminal Contract, Arrangements and Criminal Guidance Manuals. The consultation period lasted until 26 June 2006. A Contract notice was issued on 10 August 2006 detailing the changes resulting from the consultation that will come into force on 2 October 2006. This can be accessed on the CDS Contract Documentation and Guidance page.
The outcome of consultation, original consultation and covering letter are available in the Related Documents section of this page.
Outcome of Consultation - General Criminal and General Civil Contracts (April 2006)
The LSC issued consultation papers on amendments to Contracts in November 2005. The outcome of consultation document is available in the Related Documents section on the right hand side of this page.
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.
Last updated: 20 January 2006