Hardship reviews
On this page:
Applying for hardship
Applicants who believe they genuinely cannot fund their own defence if they don’t qualify for free legal aid, can ask for a hardship review – for example, if they have higher than usual essential expenditure.
They can seek this at the same time as their initial legal aid application or afterwards. They must complete a CDS16 hardship application form and submit it to the court together with supporting evidence. The application will be forwarded to the Legal Services Commission’s National Courts Team.
Differences between the hardship review
Magistrates’ court hardship application:
If your client has failed the means test, they will not receive legal aid and may then want other expenditure to be considered e.g loans, credit card debt, civil legal aid costs and utility arrears.
Following consideration of any additional expenditure, if this subsequently takes your client’s disposable income below £3,398, they will be eligible for legal aid.
Crown Court hardship application:
If your client has failed the means test, they will still receive legal aid but will need to make a monthly contribution from their income. If your client has other expenditure they wish to be considered (as above), they can make a hardship application.
Following consideration of any additional expenditure, if this reduces your client’s disposable income a revised contribution order will be issued. If it subsequently takes your client’s disposable income below £3,398, the contribution order will be revoked.
The CDS16 forms are available from the CDS > CDS Forms page of this site.
Guidance on hardship applications for solicitors and applicants is under Documents on the right of this page.
Contacting the National Courts team
Please write to:
The National Courts Team
Legal Services Commission
1st Floor, Fothergill House
16 King Street
Nottingham
NG1 2AS
DX 10035 Nottingham
Tel: 0115 908 4244
Email: nottingham.queries@legalservices.gsi.gov.uk
or:
The National Courts Team
Legal Services Commission
Cavern Court
8 Mathew Street
Liverpool
L2 6RE
DX 14208 Liverpool 1
Tel: 0151 242 5203
Email: liverpool.queries@legalservices.gsi.gov.uk
Last updated: 25 March 2011