Steve Hynes charts the geography of political celebrity advice deserts
Legal aid advice deserts are a much-discussed phenomenon. The Law Society for example has published research on the paucity of housing law firms in many areas, and in the summer a report by the Joint Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights argued that the increasing lack of legal aid firms in many parts of the country was jeopardising people’s ability to enforce their human rights. A list of legal aid suppliers recently published by the Legal Aid Agency (LAA) confirm this bleak picture.
After a procurement process for civil legal aid contracts which involved re-tendering exercises for several tranches of work due to insufficient takers, the LAA published details of all legal aid firms and other providers at the end of last month. The Directory of Legal Aid Providers is a useful guide to the availability or lack of availability of legal aid at a local level. In total there are 6,369 offices around the country offering legal aid, 1,898 in criminal and 4,471 in civil. The overall number of providers seems at first glance
