Abstract
This article focuses on the role of universities in establishing law clinics to assist individuals to make Exceptional Case Funding (ECF) applications. The Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO) removed many categories of civil matters from the scope of legal aid, reducing the number of people entitled to state-funded legal advice and assistance. To replace provision for the categories removed from scope, LASPO introduced ECF to provide a ‘safety net’ for cases where human rights would be breached if legal assistance was not available. To obtain legal aid through the ECF scheme, legal aid providers or individuals must apply to the Legal Aid Agency, the department of government within the Ministry of Justice that deals with the administration of legal aid. The article considers how analysis of ECF clinics can contribute to knowledge about the work of universities in facilitating access to justice through clinical legal education, particularly in the context of cuts to legal aid expenditure. It argues that ECF clinics present an opportunity to involve students while engaging — rather than replacing — the responsibility of the British state to provide legal aid.
Highlights
When the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO) came into effect in 2013, it had a significant impact on the availability of free legal advice and representation in England and Wales
Identifying the opportunities that Exceptional Case Funding (ECF) clinics offer as part of clinical legal education programmes is an important contribution to discussions about the role of university law clinics in access to justice work and the benefits that they can offer to the wider community
The expansion of university law clinics to assist members of the public with legal issues is important at a time where the decline of legal aid has left many people facing significant barriers to accessing the justice system without legal representation
Summary
When the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO) came into effect in 2013, it had a significant impact on the availability of free legal advice and representation in England and Wales. The LASPO Act was introduced to implement a fundamental reform of the legal aid system (Ministry of Justice 2011), which formed part of the austerity measures intended to reduce public spending. Reviewed Article (Sommerlad and Sanderson 2013), but when the legislation came into effect in 2013, LASPO had a significant impact in reducing the availability of legal aid. In this respect, it is noteworthy that legal aid was first introduced as part of the welfare state by the Legal Aid and Advice Act 1949, to ensure that those who could not afford to pay for a legal representative would not be excluded from the justice system (Sommerlad 2004). The introduction of the Act effectively reversed this, taking many categories of civil law out of scope, and reducing the availability of legal aid for significant areas of family, housing, debt, welfare benefits, discrimination, community care and immigration law
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