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Legal aid at 70: what next?

10 April 2019
Issue: 7836 / Categories: Legal News , Legal aid focus
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Lawyers gathered in London last week for a Legal Action Group (LAG) legal aid conference to celebrate 70 years since the modern legal aid system was founded.

Reporting on the conference for NLJ this week, former LAG director Steve Hynes describes how Supreme Court President Baroness Hale lamented the ‘patchy picture’ of legal help available in family law.

Lady Hale told the conference that ‘technology solutions can help but they cannot replace proper advice from a skilled person’.

Hynes says, that among delegates at the conference, there seemed to be a consensus that the Ministry of Justice’s direction of travel was right. However, he believes that ‘publicising the many positive human stories behind legal aid cases is likely to be the best way to sway political and public opinion to invest in this often maligned public service as it enters its eighth decade’.

Issue: 7836 / Categories: Legal News , Legal aid focus
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MOVERS & SHAKERS

Hugh James—Phil Edwards

Hugh James—Phil Edwards

Serious injury teambolstered by high-profile partner hire

Freeths—Melanie Stancliffe

Freeths—Melanie Stancliffe

Firm strengthens employment team with partner hire

DAC Beachcroft—Tim Barr

DAC Beachcroft—Tim Barr

Lawyers’ liability practice strengthened with partner appointment in London

NEWS
Ceri Morgan, knowledge counsel at Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer LLP, analyses the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Johnson v FirstRand Bank Ltd, which reshapes the law of fiduciary relationships and common law bribery
The boundaries of media access in family law are scrutinised by Nicholas Dobson in NLJ this week
Reflecting on personal experience, Professor Graham Zellick KC, Senior Master of the Bench and former Reader of the Middle Temple, questions the unchecked power of parliamentary privilege
Geoff Dover, managing director at Heirloom Fair Legal, sets out a blueprint for ethical litigation funding in the wake of high-profile law firm collapses
James Grice, head of innovation and AI at Lawfront, explores how artificial intelligence is transforming the legal sector
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