LEGAL AID AND ADVICE (Hansard, 28 October 1975)

§ Mr. Jack Ashley (Stoke-on-Trent, South)

I beg to move, That leave be given to bring in a Bill to amend the system of administering legal aid and advice. The purpose of my Bill is to make significant changes in the legal aid scheme. The scheme is 25 years old this month and has assisted 2 million people, recovering about £160 million in damages. This is a proud accomplishment by any standards, but I am less concerned today with the achievement of the scheme than with its shortcomings. I want to put forward some constructive proposals.

I believe that an independent public corporation, called the "Legal Services Commission", should be set up to administer the legal aid scheme in the interests of the community. It is quite wrong that the Law Society, whose prime function is the protection of the interests of the legal profession, should be administering the present legal aid system. This is not criticism of the Society, which is doing an honourable job, but it is not ideally qualified to administer a system for people in need. We need an independent commission which can administer legal aid without ambiguity and which can avoid the present conflicts between the Law Society, the legal community and local authority workers. It would be independent in every sense of the term and would not be protecting the interests of solicitors, barristers or anyone else in the legal profession.

Now it is generally agreed that, for a variety of reasons, many people are not receiving the legal assistance that they require. One of the most important reasons is that representation, under legal aid, is not allowed to people appearing before tribunals. This is a scandalous omission. It means that the powerful are protected by skilled legal representation while the weak are exposed because they cannot afford that representation and are not permitted it under the legal aid system.

This is no small problem. In 1973, the last year for which figures are available, 1,287,336 people appeared before tribunals. They were concerned with assessments of their rents, rates and taxes, 1309 among other things and, perhaps more important, many were concerned about their entitlements. They included the old, the disabled, widows, war pensioners the unemployed and immigrants. Many were poor, baffled and bewildered by the legal complexities of their cases and were quite unable to match the skills of the legal advocates who were opposed to them. The question is—what do we do to correct this glaring injustice? The answer is that we exclude them from all legal representation under the legal aid scheme. We shackle the Davids and strengthen the Goliaths.

It is sometimes claimed that these harassed individuals do not need representation because their problems are technical, but if that is the case, why do Government Departments, landlords and employers use skilled legal representation? What is sauce for the golden goose is nectar for the impoverished gander. Welfare law is just as much law as any other part of the law, even though many lawyers are unenthusiastic about performing in this field. One can only guess at the reasons for this lack of enthusiasm, but this is a very complicated and important part of the law which needs as much skill and care as do the other branches. It is inconceivable that only one side would ever receive legal representation in a criminal action, and such a situation would rightly be condemned as unjust. It is unwarrantable that we should allow this kind of blatant injustice in welfare law which affects innocent and under-privileged people.

1310 My Bill provides that all tribunals under the auspices of the Council on Tribunals should be automatically included in the legal aid scheme. There are other tribunals which do not come under the auspices of the Council, for example, the tribunal which administers the criminal injuries compensation scheme. I believe that this tribunal, among others, should be considered for inclusion in the system for legal representation. I know that it is not a statutory body, but its operations are similar to those of other tribunals and its findings are just as important.

My Bill will not become law in this Session, but I am staking a claim for progress in this negelected field and saying that the Lord Chancellor's judgment was wrong when he said that he did not regard an extension of legal aid representation before tribunals as a priority. It is a priority. Without it, injustice is not only done but is seen to be done, and that is something that cannot be tolerated in our society.