Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how much his Department has spent on external legal advice in each of the last four years.

Spend on external legal advice for the last four years is set out in the table below. The figures also include spend on legal representation as it is not possible to separate these figures. The figures are for the core Department and the larger executive agencies (NOMS, HMCTS and LAA). Smaller agencies (OPG and CICA) and NDPBs have not been included.

£5.5m of the increase in spend in 2013/14 is due to the cost of legal staff that transferred to TSol in July 2013; and c£4m is attributable to family legal representation at the Hillsborough Inquest; and c£1.4m to an increase in NOMS costs for legal representation.