Sector is heading for 'advice deserts' as specialist solicitors disappear from some regions
The legal aid system is breaking down on housing cases, law experts have warned.

The Legal Aid Practitioners Group said some parts of England and Wales had no specialist housing solicitors and the problem was getting worse.

Northampton, Swindon and parts of Kent have no specialists, and Birmingham and Shropshire have very few.

A survey by the Law Society's Gazette, supported by the LAPG, found solicitors were almost universally fed up with the legal aid system that funds their work.

Of the 270 firms surveyed, 19 had stopped doing housing work in the last year and 17 had stopped doing welfare benefits cases. A further 27 firms said they planned to stop housing work in the next five years and 33 said they intended to cut back.

The study found low pay and excessive bureaucracy were the main problems for solicitors.

A spokesperson for the Lord Chancellor's Department, the government body that oversees legal aid, said: "There are potential problems with remuneration and we take them very seriously.

"We want to eliminate unnecessary bureaucracy but we have to be sure we are getting the best value for taxpayers' money."

Law Society chief executive Janet Paraskeva warned that "advice deserts" were being created in many areas because of solicitors leaving housing work.

"This research uncovers one worrying and growing aspect – exclusion from legal advice," she said. "It reveals the danger of where there is little or no legal aid."

The LAPG's research is backed up by research by the Legal Action Group. The group found the number of specialist solicitors with government contracts to fund housing work fell 14% in the year between March 2001 and 2002.

Homelessness charity Shelter said its experience backed the research: its local advice centres are finding it increasingly difficult to get clients referred to a local specialist solicitor and its own central legal team, already under strain, is taking on extra cases.

A spokesman said: "The biggest problem is finding a solicitor in an emergency."

Legal aid: the growing problem

  • 33% of 270 solicitors surveyed did legal aid work in the housing sector
  • 91% of them said they were not satisfied with the legal aid system
  • 81% of them were less optimistic about the future of publicly funded work than they were this time last year
  • 13% of solicitors will drop housing work in the next five years; 16% will reduce it and only 1% expect to take on housing contracts for the first time
  • of the 75 firms that had dropped contract areas in the past year, 25% had dropped housing work
  • 78% did not think they would be doing as much legal aid work in five years

    • Source

    Housing Today