Category Archives: Housing

by | April 24, 2020 · 5:37 pm

Legal aid scope changes from 15 May 2020

From 15 May 2020, the existing Civil Legal Aid Procedure Regulations 2012 will be amended to enable more people to receive advice, representation and mediation funded under legal aid.

Domestic abuse

The supporting documents acceptable as evidence of domestic abuse are extended as follows:

Schedule 1 (14) “A letter from an independent domestic violence advisor confirming that they are providing or have provided support to A.”

Schedule 1 (15) “A letter from an independent sexual violence advisor confirming that they are providing or have provided support to A relating to sexual violence by B.”

Schedule 1(17)
(1) A letter from an organisation providing domestic violence support services.
(2) The letter must confirm that it –
(a)   is situated in the United Kingdom [formerly restricted to England and Wales];
(b)   that the organisation has been operating for an uninterrupted period of six months or more; and
(c)   provided A with support in relation to A’s needs as a victim, or person at risk, of domestic violence
(3) The letter must contain –
(a)   a statement to the effect that, in the reasonable professional judgement of the author the letter, A is, or is at risk of being, a victim of domestic violence;
(b)   a description of specific matters relied upon to support that judgement;
(c)   a description of the support provided to A; and
(d)   a statement of the reasons why A needed that support.

Note that the LAA removed the requirement for such letters to be on letterhead during the COVID-19 Pandemic on 9 April.

Schedule 1 (20) “A letter from the Secretary of State for the Home Department confirming that A has been granted leave to remain in the United Kingdom as a victim of domestic violence [formerly under Paragraph 289B of the Immigration Rules].”

Mediation

The applicant for Family Mediation no longer has to attend the mediator’s premises in person if the mediator decides it is not necessary.

Alternatively, if the applicant cannot attend in person for a good reason, they can authorise someone else to attend on their behalf. The application form still needs to be completed and documentary evidence of financial eligibility must still be provided. See the Civil Legal Aid (Procedure) (Amendment) Regulations 2020 SI 439, reg 7 for more information.

Education, Discrimination, and Owner occupiers facing loss of their home

The mandatory route to legal aid through the Civil Legal Aid telephone service will no longer apply from 15 May 2020. Members of the public will be able to use the telephone service if they wish; but they will be free to use a local provider with a contract if they would prefer to do so.

Local providers with a Housing contract will be able to advise/represent owner occupiers facing loss of their home due to default on secured loans falling into the Debt category.

All Housing contracts include a notional four Legal Help matter starts for Debt matters. These can be increased to six by the contract holding organisation, after they have notified their Contract Manager. If they need more matter starts, they can apply for them (Standard Civil Contract Specification paras 1.21–1.24).

Education Local providers with a contract in this category will be able to advise/represent in special educational needs cases.

Local providers with Discrimination contracts will be able to advise on discrimination cases, even where they would normally be out of scope, e.g. employment.

Inquests Legal help for inquests can be backdated where the Director of Legal Aid disapplies financial eligibility limits in relation to the application.

Vicky Ling
24 April 2020

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by | January 31, 2019 · 9:19 am

LAA gets new power to backdate funding

Following the successful challenge in R (Duncan Lewis Solicitors Ltd) v Director of Legal Aid Casework and the Lord Chancellor in October 2018, the LAA has announced that it will get new powers to backdate funding under legal aid certificates in urgent cases from 20 February 2019. The challenge was to a refusal by the LAA to backdate funding in an urgent immigration judicial review case to the date of the application where legal action had to be taken very quickly, even though the solicitors had made the application as promptly as possible.

The backdating power is likely to benefit clients needing to challenge decisions by public authorities where delegated functions are not available. However, the LAA will provide more guidance in due course before the new power comes into effect.

The amendments to the Legal Aid (Procedure) Regulations 2012 which will bring this change into force can be found here.

The LAA will be closing its ‘out of hours’ service as a result of this new power. It has stressed that this change will not affect delegated functions which will remain available where appropriate. There is more information here.

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by | October 30, 2018 · 6:20 pm

New housing court duty tender opens

Following the collapse of the last tender, found unlawful by the High Court, the LAA extended the contracts of existing providers. However, in four areas existing contract holders were unable to continue, so the LAA is tendering for replacements. The affected areas are:

  • Barnet
  • Bodmin and Truro
  • Grimsby
  • Winchester

The tender closes on 26 November at 9am and the IFA can be found here.

The new LAG Legal Aid Handbook 2018/19 is out now – featuring full coverage of the civil and criminal schemes, fully revised and updated and including the 2018 civil contract. This edition includes brand new chapters on CCMS and community care, specialist chapters on housing, family, mental health, immigration and crime work, and greatly expanded coverage of civil costs. Written by a team of legal aid experts and edited by Vicky Ling, Simon Pugh and Sue James, it’s the one book no legal aid lawyer can afford to be without. Order your copy here now.

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by | September 3, 2018 · 9:02 pm

A turbulent August

The summer is usually a quiet time; not so this year. There has been much going on, both in civil and crime, so here is a round up of recent events.

Two more JR losses

The MoJ and LAA have lost two more judicial reviews, both lost because of deficiencies in policy making and in the fairness of the LAA’s approach – making three in recent months (following the housing court tender) where the High Court has been seriously critical of MoJ / LAA failings.

In The Law Society, R (On the Application Of) v The Lord Chancellor [2018] EWHC 2094 (Admin), Leggatt LJ and Carr J quashed the recent changes to LGFS. Although critical of the Law Society’s conduct of the litigation, their strongest words were saved for the conduct of the MoJ consultation, which was found to be not open and transparent, in particular because the underlying analysis was not only withheld but concealed. The analysis itself was statistically flawed and could not be relied on. And, in respect of the Lord Chancellor’s argument that these failings did not prejudice the fairness of the consultation, the court said that “It is difficult to express in language of appropriate moderation why we consider these arguments without merit”.

Ames, R (On the Application Of) v The Lord Chancellor [2018] EWHC 2250 (Admin) is a case about the quantum of counsels’ fees in a criminal VHCC. As part of the negotiations, the LAA relied on figures produced by its internal “calculator”, but refused to disclose the calculator or any other policy or guidance it used for setting the amounts of reasonable work and the fees payable. The court pointed out that for all other fee schemes, the rates of pay and the basis of calculating fees were published in regulations. It found that the failure to disclose it was irrational and in breach of a duty of transparency and clarity to those whose fees were to be determined by it, a failing compounded by a further failure to engage with the arguments counsel seeking payment made, and mistakes in the LAA’s own calculations. The court directed the calculator and associated guidance to be disclosed.

New civil contracts start 1 September – or do they?

Organisations awarded civil contracts from 1 September 2018 were, in many cases, left in considerable doubt about whether they’d be able to continue as the LAA failed to upload contracts for signature for some successful bidders. Unless the contract has been uploaded by the LAA, and then accepted and executed, you do not have a valid 2018 contract and will not be paid for work done from 1 September 2018 (except under the remainder work provisions of the old contract).

There was no public announcement of what organisations in this position should do in the run up to the start date. LAPG was in constant contact with the LAA and kept its members up to date as best as it could (any legal aid lawyers not members of LAPG really should be). But it was not until late on Friday evening, just before the midnight end of the old contract, that the LAA announced that it was creating a special seven day emergency contract. It has issued further guidance on Monday – if your organisation is affected, make sure you check Bravo regularly and have uploaded everything the LAA has asked for. The LAA has said that organisations operating under the emergency contract will not be able to apply for certificates through CCMS, so you should either wait until your full contract is confirmed, or – if the work is urgent – call the LAA on 0300 200 2020.

New civil guidance

The LAA has begun the process of updating its guidance to take account of the 2018 contract – so far the costs assessment guidance and the escape cases handbook have been updated.

AGFS consultation

As part of its deal with Bar that led to the calling off of action earlier this year, the MoJ promised to re-work the AGFS scheme and invest a further £15million into it. The MoJ opened a consultation into the detail of how this would be done – it closes on 28 September.

The new LAG Legal Aid Handbook 2018/19 is out now – featuring full coverage of the civil and criminal schemes, fully revised and updated and including the 2018 civil contract. This edition includes brand new chapters on CCMS and community care, specialist chapters on housing, family, mental health, immigration and crime work, and greatly expanded coverage of civil costs. Written by a team of legal aid experts and edited by Vicky Ling, Simon Pugh and Sue James, it’s the one book no legal aid lawyer can afford to be without. Order your copy here now.

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by | July 7, 2018 · 11:06 am

New LAG Legal Aid Handbook

We’re delighted that the new Handbook, 2018-19 edition, will be published at the end of this month.The new edition is fully revised and updated and packed full of useful advice, hints and tips and guidance. It’s the only fully comprehensive guide to the whole legal aid scheme, described by some readers as the ‘bible on legal aid’.

This edition welcomes a new general editor joining Vicky and Simon, Sue James. Sue needs no introduction to legal aid lawyers as a leading housing lawyer and the recipient of a LALY lifetime achievement award.

Anthony Edwards returns to edit the crime sections, and his vast experience and knowledge makes that section indispensable for criminal lawyers.

Returning contributors Steve Hynes and Richard Charlton have updated their chapters on policy and mental health. For this edition we have brand new content of interest to all civil legal aid lawyers from a range of expert practitioners:

  • Leading costs lawyer and chair of the ACL legal aid group Paul Seddon has revised and greatly extended the civil costs chapter
  • Simpson Millar solicitor and LALY nominee Silvia Nicolaou Garcia has contributed a brand new chapter on community care
  • Consultant and IT expert Jane Pritchard has written a detailed guide to using CCMS

Bigger and better than ever and fully up to date including the 2018 contracts, the Handbook is the one book no legal aid lawyer can afford to be without. Pre-order your copy now from the LAG Bookshop

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by | July 7, 2018 · 9:58 am

Housing court duty tender cancelled

As we reported here, the High Court quashed the LAA’s decision to re-configure the boundaries of court duty schemes and tender based on the larger scheme areas. It found the basis for the plan to be so lacking in evidence as to render the decision irrational. As a result the LAA has now announced that it has cancelled the tender. Any bidders previously notified of a successful outcome will not now be awarded a contract. Although the announcement does not set out next steps, we understand the LAA has now written to existing providers offering a one year extension to 30 September 2019. The work will be based on the 2013 contract specification, not the new 2018 specification.The purpose of the one year extension is said to be

to enable a review of relevant policy and to provide the time needed to prepare and run a new procurement exercise for these services.

Existing providers who wish to continue will be required to have a 2018 contract in housing and debt. It is not clear what provision the LAA has put in place where the existing contract holder has not bid for a 2018 contract, which would mean they cannot continue and therefore there is no provider to continue the existing scheme until September 2019.

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by | June 27, 2018 · 8:27 am

Housing Court Duty Tender Quashed

The High Court has quashed the LAA’s tender for housing court duty possession schemes in R (Law Centres Federation Limited) v Lord Chancellor [2018] EWHC 1588 (Admin). The Law Centres Federation argued that the decision to reduce the number of contracts available by increasing the size of scheme areas to cover multiple courts was irrational and in breach of the public sector equality duty.

Andrews J was heavily critical of the LAA and MoJ’s approach to decision making, in particular the gathering of evidence. She found that a series of questionable assumptions without data had been made, and the position of the representative bodies mis-represented. Submissions to ministers were “woefully inadequate” and necessary enquires had not been carried out. As a result, the minister making the decision was misled and not properly briefed, and consequently reached a decision no minister, properly briefed and in possession of all the facts, could reasonably have reached.

It is not yet known whether the Lord Chancellor will appeal or what action the LAA will take to ensure schemes can operate beyond September 2018 now that the tender process awarding new contracts has been quashed, with existing providers already given notice of termination. We will report developments.

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by | April 28, 2018 · 6:25 pm

LAA amends contracts for GDPR

The LAA has amended all current contracts in order to meet the requirements imposed by the General Data Protection Regulation (Regulation (EU) 2016/679) and the Law Enforcement Directive (Directive (EU) 2016/680), being implemented under Part 3 of the Data Protection bill. Amendments regarding the GDPR apply from 25 May 2018. Amendments relating to the Directive apply from 6 May 2018.

There are some detailed obligations. The LAA require you to notify them within 5 business days if you receive the following in relation to LAA or shared data:

  • A data subject request
  • A request to rectify, block or erase personal data
  • A complaint or other communication about your (or the LAA’s) handling of data
  • A communication from the Information Commissioner

You must also indemnify the LAA if it is fined because you fail to comply with the legislation.

You can find more information here.

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by | April 9, 2018 · 4:39 pm

New Civil Keycard Issued Today

This afternoon the LAA issued a new civil keycard, keycard 54, containing revised eligibility limits. The main change appears to be a small reduction in dependant’s allowances.

It is unfortunate that the keycard was not issued until the afternoon of the day it came into force. You may wish to check any grants, particularly of Legal Help and CLR, made today to confirm the client is eligible.

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by | April 3, 2018 · 10:37 pm

2018 Civil Contracts Update

Just before Easter, the LAA released some more information about the 2018 civil tender process.

The failed discrimination tender will be re-run, though in the education category existing providers have agreed to continue, so no re-tender will be necessary.

In housing the LAA has failed to secure court duty provision in Cornwall. In 39 procurement areas, no or only one compliant bid for face to face contracts was received, so the LAA will be re-tendering in late April 2018. These areas include the whole of the South West of England beyond Bristol and Somerset, much of northern England outside the major urban areas and parts of the Midlands. Meanwhile, the Law Centres Network has been given permission to judicially review the court duty tender process as a whole, with a hearing listed for next month.

In family, there were 7 areas with no or one bidder, and 6 in immigration.

The full list of areas that will be re-tendered can be found in Annex A of the LAA’s update, here.

This level of procurement failure is unprecedented in legal aid. The initial tender exercise failed to find any successful bidders in two whole areas of law – education and discrimination – and leaves many areas of the country without meaningful access to legal aid in other areas. It is a further development of a process of market failure which has been underway for a long time, accelerated by LASPO, where in many places it is no longer viable to continue legal aid work. It is difficult to see how a repeated tender exercise – based on the same scope restrictions, payment rates, and contract terms – will yield a significantly different outcome. Last week Community Law Partnership, a top firm of housing lawyers in Birmingham, tweeted a typical case of a family turned away from housing assistance and only housed after a threat of judicial review. The entire thread sums up the value of the work they and others like them do – and ended with a reminder of why there are ever fewer who can.

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