Online courts and the promised review of LASPO (Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012) are two examples of the ‘groaning in-tray’ that the next Lord Chancellor will encounter, says Steve Hynes, director of the Legal Action Group.
The Prisons and Courts Bill will likely be back on the books if the Conservative win a majority, including online courts and the need both to provide safeguards for users and to assess which tasks can be delegated to non-legally qualified staff.
However, the hardest job for the Lord Chancellor, whoever he or she may be, will be balancing the books, Hynes writes in this week’s NLJ. Both the ongoing modernisation of the courts and the increased capital spending on the prisons estate have potential to overrun and to need more cash, he says. Hynes advises the Lord Chancellor to avoid further hikes in court and tribunal fees, as these combined with LASPO cuts to civil legal aid, are having ‘a clear chilling effect on access to justice’.
