Asked by: Keith Vaz (Labour - Leicester East)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Attorney General, whether a suicide note is classified as a legal document.
Answered by Robert Buckland
The Attorney General’s Office is not responsible for determining the legal status of any document. The legal status of a document would depend on a number of factors including the context it was being presented in.
Asked by: Keith Vaz (Labour - Leicester East)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Attorney General, how many lawyers are employed in the Government Legal Service; and how many such lawyers are (a) women and (b) from ethnic minority communities.
Answered by Robert Buckland
The Government Legal Service (GLS) is not a department but a grouping of the legal profession within Government. Government lawyers take different forms; some are employed by the Government Legal Department (GLD), others employed by regulators and organisations at arm’s length from Government. The GLS is supported by a very small secretariat of fewer than five staff and does not systematically collect information as data is held by the lawyer’s own organisations. We are therefore unable to provide this information for the GLS. There is data for the GLD, which is the single largest ‘member’ of the GLS and the largest provider of legal services to government. As of 31 December 2016 the figures for the Government Legal Department are as follows:
Number of lawyers | 1,400 |
Number of female lawyers | 896 |
Number of lawyers from ethnic minority communities * | 187 |
Number of female lawyers from ethnic minority communities * | 132 |
*This figure is obtained from the information that is voluntarily self-recorded by employees
Asked by: Keith Vaz (Labour - Leicester East)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Attorney General, what the cost to his Department was of the use of external lawyers by his Department (a) in general and (b) related to the work of the Treasury Solicitors in (i) 2016, (ii) 2015 and (iii) 2014.
Answered by Robert Buckland
The cost relating to the use of external lawyers (including lawyers in the Government Legal Department, formerly the Treasury Solicitor’s Department) by the Attorney General’s Office for the last three financial years is in the table below:
£ | 2013-14 | 2014-15 | 2015-16 |
Cost of GLD lawyers | 425,859 | 330,442 | 322,023 |
Cost of GLD disbursements (Counsel) | 210,537 | 340,640 | 220,182 |
Cost of GLD disbursements (Other external lawyers) | 40,153 | 8,677 | - |
Non-GLD legal fees (Counsel) | 18,816 | 14,252 | 18,949 |
Total external legal fees | 695,366 | 694,011 | 561,153 |
All figures are exclusive of VAT.
Asked by: Keith Vaz (Labour - Leicester East)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Attorney General, pursuant to the Answer of 8 July 2014, Official Report, column 184W, on consultants, who the consultants were; what they were contracted to do; and how much each was paid.
Answered by Robert Buckland
The information requested in respect of the Crown Prosecution Service was contained in an answer given to the Rt. Hon Member by the Attorney General on the 16th July (Official Report, Col 678W).
The table below contains details on the consultants used by the SFO since 2010-11.
Year | Contractor | Work type | Amount (£) |
2010-11 | PA Consultancy | Support work for senior management | 986k |
2010-11 | Corven | Development work relating to Deferred Prosecution Agreements; coaching | 480k |
2010-11 | SCC | IT consultancy | 60k |
2010-11 | DTZ | Preparation of Business case for relocation and satellite offices | 24k |
2010-11 | Morland Consulting | Research & Support Strategic Risk Assessment | 10k |
2010-11 | Processflows Ltd | IT consultancy | 1k |
2010-11 | Ravn Systems Ltd | IT consultancy | 7k |
2011-12 | PA Consultancy | Support work for senior management | 208k |
2011-12 | Corven | Consultancy work relating to Deferred Prosecution Agreements | 542k |
2011-12 | BNP Paribas | Lease surrender | 61k |
2011-12 | Ravn Systems | IT consultancy | 44k |
2011-12 | Hill and Knowlton | Communication advice | 1k |
2012-13 | PA Consultancy | Late invoice for work in 2011-12 (as above) | 31k |
2013-14 | SCC | IT consultancy | 32k |
2013-14 | CIO Partners | Preparation of specialist IT specification | 2k |
2013-14 | Others* | Data management reviews | 14k |
* Two individuals carried out some work relating to an incident of data loss
Note 1: Records for this type of expenditure were not properly documented prior to April 2012. Available records are summarised above:
Note 2: The combined total of costs for the year 2010/11 does not match SFO’s previously published figures. The previous figure was understated by £10k because of credits for late invoices relating to 2009/10 which had been incorrectly categorised as consultancy expenditure.
Asked by: Keith Vaz (Labour - Leicester East)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Attorney General, pursuant to the Answer of 16 June 2014, Official Report, column 389W, on the legal profession, what proportion of the money spent on consultancy fees by the Crown Prosecution Service was paid to which companies for what services in (a) 2010, (b) 2011, (c) 2012, (d) 2013 and (e) 2014 to date.
Answered by Jeremy Wright
A table setting out the proportion of the money spent on consultancy fees by the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) paid to companies for services in financial years from 2010/11 to 2013/14 has been placed in the Library of the House, together with the corresponding expenditure. The CPS financial reporting systems are configured to provide information based on financial rather than calendar years.
Asked by: Keith Vaz (Labour - Leicester East)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Attorney General, what the cost to the public purse was of external consultants employed by (a) the Serious Fraud Office and (b) the Crown Prosecution Service in (i) 2010, (ii) 2011, (iii) 2012, (iv) 2013 and (v) 2014 to date.
Answered by Oliver Heald
The following table contains details on the expenditure on external consultants by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) and Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) during the past four complete financial years. Both organisations financial reporting systems are configured to provide information based on financial rather than calendar years.
Year | External Consultants Expenditure | |
| CPS | SFO |
2010-11 | £684,314 | £1,557,887 |
2011-12 | £13,347 | £856,182 |
2012-13 | £9,793 | £31,142* |
2013-14 | £960 | £48,228 (subject to audit) |
* The expenditure listed for 2012-13 was actually incurred in 2011-12 but not paid until the following year.
Asked by: Keith Vaz (Labour - Leicester East)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Attorney General, what the cost to the public purse was of external lawyers employed by (a) the Serious Fraud Office and (b) the Crown Prosecution Service in (i) 2010, (ii) 2011, (iii) 2012, (iv) 2013 and (v) 2014 to date.
Answered by Oliver Heald
The amounts spent by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) and the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) on external lawyers in each of the last four financial years is shown in the following table. Both organisations financial reporting systems are configured to provide information based on financial rather than calendar years.
Expenditure on external lawyers | ||
Year | CPS | SFO |
2010-11 | £139,219,000 | £4,523,561 |
2011-12 | £115,329,000 | £4,822,253 |
2012-13 | £118,908,000 | £5,956,633 |
2013-14 | £122,929,000 | £19,077,467 |
The SFO figures include the cost of external counsel, TSol and other legal fees, but do not include temporary agency staff. The SFO spend on counsel fees is published in its annual report. The increased figures for 2012-13 and 2013-14 reflect the revised treatment of VAT on some fees, repayment of some VAT which had been incorrectly recovered in earlier years, and costs relating to some very large cases and other litigation.
The SFO's requirement for additional expenditure in 2013-14 has already been set out to the House in documentation published around its Spring Supplementary Estimate, which has been scrutinised by the Justice Select Committee. The nature of the SFO's work means that it can occasionally incur significant additional legal expenses for its very largest and mostcomplex investigations and prosecutions, such as that into Libor.
The CPS figures are drawn from the CPS's core financial accounting system and they are consistent with the CPS's audited accounts. The great majority of fees for legal work paid by the CPS relates to the services of self-employed barristers and solicitors for crown court casework. The CPS also engages barristers and solicitors to undertake advocacy as agents in magistrates' courts sessions and, occasionally, to provide legal advice on discrete areas of specialist policy.
Asked by: Keith Vaz (Labour - Leicester East)
Question to the Attorney General:
To ask the Attorney General, how many lawyers were employed in the Treasury Solicitor's Department in (a) 2010, (b) 2011, (c) 2012, (d) 2013 and (e) 2014 to date.
Answered by Oliver Heald
The figures below give the number of lawyers employed in the Treasury Solicitor's Department (TSol), as at 31st March each year and to date for 2014.
Year | Full Time Equivalent |
31st May 2014 | 910 |
31st March 2013 | 572 |
31st March 2012 | 565 |
31st March 2011 | 464 |
31st March 2010 | 451 |
The figures given are for permanent staff.
Since 2010 TSol has been engaged on a process of transferring lawyers from other departments to TSol as part of the the Shared Legal Services Programme. Sharing legal services brings considerable benefits including greater flexibility and resiliance, more efficient deployment of legal resources, more opportunities for savings and improved knowledge sharing, which in turn supports consistency of legal advice across Government.