The Law Society is feeling the heat, notes Jon Robins
You could almost feel sorry for the Law Society. I don’t expect many defence lawyers to share in that sentiment. It was an impossible task to steer a coherent course between the policy of a government hellbent on dismantling as much of the legal aid scheme as it can get its hands on and the interests of an impoverished, fractured and fractious section of the profession.
Strike threat
For the first time defence lawyers have managed to stop fighting among themselves for a sufficient period of time to seriously pose the threat of industrial action. Just to recap, last month the government published its response to Transforming Legal Aid which proposed a further £220m cut to the legal aid budget from the criminal budget. In April, LASPO (the Legal Aid Sentencing and Protection of Offenders Act 2012) slashed £350m off the civil budget.
Chris Grayling announced a u-turn (of sorts) and ditched plans to introduce the hugely divisive system of price competitive tendering which would have seen the total number of 1,600 firms shrunk
