Draft Early Legal Advice Pilot Scheme Order 2022

Jonathan Djanogly Excerpts

Thursday 24th February 2022 General Committees

[Mr Jonathan Djanogly (Huntingdon) (Con)]

As the former Minister responsible for LASPO, I thought I should give a view. When we were looking at the legislation initially, the view was taken that the provision in the voluntary sector was often better than that being provided by the legal sector. In addition, there was the point about the holistic approach just made by the hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton: lawyers would not necessarily look at things from a holistic point of view, and people in the voluntary sector often took a more rounded view. Therefore, the decision was made to take these issues out of scope.

Times have moved on. It might be that the voluntary sector does not have the provision that it once did—I am interested to hear the Minister’s view on that—so I think it is wise to have this pilot, because it will enable the Minister to assess the situation and see whether he has got this right; he is doing this in the right way. I am interested to hear his views.