The Funding Code

On this page:

What is the Funding Code?
What do we fund?
Updates to the Funding Code
Public Interest Reports
Cross Border Disputes Direction
For more information

What is the Funding Code?

The Funding Code is the set of rules we use to decide what individual cases we will fund through civil legal aid. It comes in three parts:

Funding Code: Criteria
Funding Code: Procedures
Funding Code: Decision Making Guidance.

All are in the Documents panel.

The versions shown apply from October 2007. The Decision Making Guidance has been divided into several parts:

General Principles
Family
Immigration
Exceptional Funding
Other Guidance.

What do we fund?

The Criteria define what services the LSC will fund ranging from basic legal advice to representation in court proceedings.

Different criteria are set for different types of case according to the Lord Chancellor's priorities.

The Procedures set out how the LSC makes decisions about funding civil legal aid. They explains the four ways services are delivered:

Controlled Work
Licensed Work
Other Contracted Work
Non-Contracted Work.

The Decision Making Guidance helps inform practitioners working under the Funding Code.

It should be considered along with the:

provisions of the Funding Code Criteria and Procedures
the Access to Justice Act 1999
directions, orders and regulations made under the Act
provisions of the Human Rights Act 1998.

Statutory material is on the Legislation pages.

Updates to the Funding Code

We update the Funding Code to reflect:

changes in the law
policy developments following consultation.

Please visit the Guidance on funding decisions page to read more.

Public Interest Reports

The LSC established an advisory panel to help our regional offices make decisions on cases that may have a public interest element. This can affect:

whether a case is within scope
how the merits, cost benefit and affordability of a case should be approached.

Visit the Public Interest Reports page to read more.

Cross Border Disputes Direction

With effect from 16 June the Lord Chancellor has issued a Direction, which facilitates the funding of cross border legal aid applications under the EU legal aid Directive.

The effect of this Direction is that it provides for cases within its scope to be funded directly by the LSC rather than having to be forwarded to ministers under the section 6 (8) (b) procedure. It also ensures that cross border cases are not excluded from scope where this would be inconsistent with the Legal Aid Directive.

Applications made under this Direction should be made to the Special Cases Unit using the same procedures as apply to exceptional funding applications – See Rule D10 of the Funding Code Procedures as amended.

For more information

The Funding Code is in the Documents panel. It is also in Volume 3 of the LSC Manual.

Please contact the Customer Service team with any other questions.

Please contact the Family team for family related queries.

Statutory material is under the Legislation pages.

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Last updated: 16 July 2008