If the justice system is to work, all of its parts must be in working order and that’s why the funding of criminal legal aid matters, writes John Gould, senior partner, Russell-Cooke, in this week’s NLJ
Both giving money to lawyers and funding defence for criminal suspects are unlikely election-winning gambits for politicians. As Gould points out “there are few votes in fair trials”.
Nevertheless, all constituent parts must work and few functions of government are ‘more fundamental than maintaining law and order through an effective criminal justice system; yet it has fallen into such a state of disrepair that it is now possible to contemplate a situation in which it stops working entirely’.
RELATED ARTICLES
