Criminal Legal Aid Reforms

Debate between Karl Turner and David Mowat

Wednesday 4th September 2013 Westminster Hall

[Karl Turner]

Absolutely. That is an excellent point. It is just the reality of business. Small firms of solicitors have established themselves over a long period. The hon. Member for Warrington South (David Mowat) thinks that my remarks are amusing. They may be amusing to him, but I can tell him that the reality of the proposals will not be funny to people in my constituency who are looking to access justice.

[David Mowat (Warrington South) (Con)]

I am listening very carefully to the hon. Gentleman’s remarks, and he is making a strong case for access to justice with which no one, in any part of the House, would disagree. What I would be interested to understand, though, is whether his position is that legal aid as it is currently is pretty much right and cannot be reformed or that reforms are possible but the Government are pursuing the wrong ones. If it is the latter, why has the Bar Council not come forward with more substantive proposals than it has apparently done so far?

[Karl Turner]

I am not the Bar Council; I do not represent the Bar Council. It is not for me to say why it has not come forward with proposals, but my opinion is this. Why should the Bar Council, the Criminal Law Solicitors Association, the Criminal Bar Association or any other organisation that represents the professionals come up and do the Government’s job? I suggest that the hon. Gentleman goes away and reads the evidence of the Justice Committee and looks at the proposals put forward by the experts—the practitioners, the people who do this work every day. Michael Turner, QC, came up with a suggestion for making £2 billion of savings if the Lord Chancellor was only prepared to allow him enough time to sit down and discuss the proposals with him.

[David Mowat]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for giving way again. I thought I heard him earlier give that figure of £2 billion, which of course is a very significant amount. I believe that it is 10 times the amount that the Lord Chancellor is seeking. If Michael Turner has identified £2 billion of savings, would it be possible for the hon. Gentleman to identify for other hon. Members the main areas in which those savings would be made?

[Karl Turner]

The former chairman of the Criminal Bar Association put forward various suggestions in the Justice Committee evidence session. I happen to think that some of them are feasible. He talked about saving money in courts. In my experience, an awful lot of money is wasted in the courts system. Then there is the Crown Prosecution Service. I do not mean to criticise colleagues in the profession, but very often defence lawyers are blamed for delays and loss of court time when in fact it is the CPS, whose staff are rushed off their feet, overworked—in my area, the service is terribly understaffed—that causes the delay. There are all sorts of things that the Government could look at, but the reality is that the Lord Chancellor is simply not prepared to sit down and discuss them. I am hoping that the new chairman of the Criminal Bar Association, Nigel Lithman, QC, has the ability to persuade the Lord Chancellor to sit round a table and discuss the proposals.