Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, with reference to the Answer of 25 October 2023 to Question 203252 on Housing Loss Prevention Advice Service, what the (a) number and (b) value was of claims arising from provision of early advice by Housing Loss Prevention Advice Service providers as of 13 November 2023, based on the Contact Report Forms submitted to the Legal Aid Agency up to that date.

As of 13 November, 79 claims with a value of £14,797.83 have been submitted to and processed by the LAA in respect of the provision of early legal advice by HLPAS providers.

As of 13 November, 3,868 claims with a value of £408,894.92 have been submitted to and processed by the LAA in respect of in-court duty assistance by HLPAS providers.

As of 13 November, a total of £14,797.83 has been paid to service providers in respect of the provision of early advice. A total of £405,248.03 has been paid to service providers in respect of the provision of in-court duty assistance.

Payments for HLPAS work are paid a month in arrears. The response provided only covers payments which have been subject to a full validation process. The amount paid by the LAA may differ to the amount claimed if any errors or anomalies are identified.

Notes on data:

1. The data regarding claim volume and value has been extracted from information processed by the LAA on 14 November 2023. The data is subject to change as the LAA continues to process and validate claims it receives.
2. The data is Management Information manually collated by the LAA based on information received via provider submissions. Although every effort is made to ensure that the figures presented are accurate and complete, it is important to note that the data has been extracted from data sets which require a degree of manual input. As a consequence, the data can change over time and care should be taken to ensure data collection processes and their inevitable limitations are taken into account when data is used.