Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Justice for All - Sheffield says No Cuts to Free Advice

Justice For All | 30.05.2011 21:27 | Repression | Sheffield

Advice workers and Solicitors are demonstrating at a rally outside Sheffield Town Hall On Friday 3rd June at 5pm, at Government plans to cut two-thirds of legal aid to their clients.

Legal aid workers are angry that the Government proposals will hit the poorest people the hardest and that the main cuts are targeted at low-cost preventative work – not expensive high-profile trials.

Under Government plans, free legal advice would be abolished for problems with employment, welfare benefits, family law, immigration and consumer problems, as well as most debt and housing advice. At present, this is delivered to people on low incomes by Citizens Advice Bureaux, independent advice centres, the Law Centre and private practice solicitors.

Many solicitors firms have stopped doing legal aid work in recent years and now only offer paid-for services to those who can afford them. The effect of the proposed cuts is to abolish the advice needed by an estimated 650,000 people each year.

Speakers at the event include Green Party councillor Jillian Creasy, MP David Blunkett, along with legal aid practitioners and clients of these vital services.

Carita Thomas, of Young Legal Aid Lawyers, said:

“Legal aid is a safety net for the most vulnerable. It is there to help people through the hard times, whether it’s getting contact with their kids or employment or debt advice when they lose their jobs. The government's cuts will hit us all but particularly women, minorities and the disabled who are most likely to need free help.”

“If we want a fair society, taking away the means by which people can be equal before the law is not the way to go about it.”

Douglas Johnson of Sheffield Law Centre, said,

“Charities like ours, and our clients, will feel the biggest cuts. The Government says the voluntary sector will face a massive 77% cut from the legal aid budget. This is on top of further cuts proposed for anti-discrimination casework. It is clearly intended to hit the most vulnerable and disadvantaged.”

Chris Cole of Cole & Yousaf Solicitors said,

“What’s staggering about the Government’s proposals is that they are aimed at the areas of preventative work that help people sort out their everyday problems before they become a crisis that would cost the State a lot more in social care.”

Councillor Jillian Creasy said,

“Everyone needs access to free legal advice to nip problems in the bud and prevent them escalating. As a Green councillor, I do hundreds of pieces of casework each year and it's vital that I can refer on to local services like Sharrow CAB, funded by legal aid, when more specialist advice is needed.”

Geraldine O’Connor said,

“If the government takes away free legal aid, it will be one law for the rich, one law for the poor.”

“This is intolerable in a so-called democracy. I am a disabled woman and had to stop work because of my illness, which meant I got into debt. I turned to legal aid to get help sorting out repayments. Without my solicitor, I would have been sunk.”

NOTES TO EDITORS

1. The Government’s Green Paper “Proposals for the Reform of Legal Aid in England and Wales” was published in November 2010. Over 5000 organisations and individuals responded to the consultation.

2. The main proposal is to remove legal aid for employment problems; clinical negligence (complaints about healthcare); consumer problems and contracts; debts such as council tax, utilities, credit card debts, fines, unsecured personal loans, overdrafts and hire purchase debts and insolvency problems; criminal injuries; education issues (problems at school or college); welfare benefits and asylum support; family law cases where there has been no physical violence; most housing cases; most immigration cases unless people are actually detained; assaults; negligence; false imprisonment. Legal aid will not be available in these areas, regardless of the merits of the case. There will be no legal aid for appeals against bad decisions in these cases.

3. Legal aid expenditure was £2.1 billion in 2008/09, of which £700m (33%) was for high- level criminal cases (Crown Court trials), £650m (31%) was for full civil legal aid. Only £263m (121⁄2%) was spent on civil legal aid advice and assistance (“legal help”). The not- for-profit sector (CABx, Law centres, independent advice centres, etc.) benefits from £78m of this funding.

4. The Government proposes to cut 28% of legal aid funding. The NFP sector will be affected by a cut of 77% of its funding.

5. 943,904 people were helped with legal aid in 2010-11; under the proposals, 653,659 people will no longer be able to receive a service, according to research by the Legal Action Group.

6. In 2009, the Legal Services Commission said, “Legal aid gives people who can least afford it access to justice, which provides a vital safety net and makes our society a civilised one.”

7. Justice for All (  http://www.justice-for-all.org.uk/ ) is a collation of over 3000 charities, legal and advice agencies, politicians, trade unions, community groups and members of the public. Justice for All is holding a national day of action on 3rd June to raise awareness of the effect of the proposed cut in access to justice, with a series of events around the country.

Justice For All
- Homepage: http://www.justice-for-all.org.uk/

Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech