No win no fee personal injury claims and legal aid in the UK

April 1st 2013 is a significant date, and not just because it means its prank season for all. It’s significant due to the coming into the force of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012. This piece of legislation is another in a line of acts of parliament designed to restrict the ambit of legal aid in the UK.

Legal Aid in 2012

Before moving onto the changes it is wise to sum up the role of legal aid and what types of cases are eligible right now. Legal aid is the name given to financial assistance funded by the government to those who need it. In essence it is there to make sure that access to justice is available for all regardless of personal circumstances or wealth. Now not all cases qualify for legal aid, criminal cases especially serious cases will usually always qualify. However civil cases are not all covered. Personal injury cases for instance are not covered, unless it is for medical negligence. Continue reading

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Can you claim legal aid when pursuing a work-related injury claim?

If you have an accident at work and it wasn’t your fault you may be able to claim compensation. Any claim you make will cover any lost wages and medical bills. Now there are different routes to making a claim and this will depend on a variety of things, which we will discuss in a moment. First of all lets dispense with a common misconception. Yes any claim you make will be against your employer. However, there is nothing to fear in way of retribution. It is actually against the law for you to be punished in any form, be that through disciplinary action or poor treatment. See this link here that details a case that Thompsons Solicitors brought against a former employee for both his injury at work and for releasing him from his employment with him (http://www.thompsons.law.co.uk/ntext/workplace-injury-broken-foot.htm) Continue reading

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Personal Injury claims & legal aid

Compensation culture is a hot topic and popular media buzzword these days and it has been since early this millennia. In spite of considerable media sensationalism and scapegoat finger-pointing, there are number of factors which have contributed to the situation we now find ourselves in. It all started with an adjustment to the Legal Aid bill made in the late 1990s. There was a time when legal aid used to include personal injury in the eligibility list. However, it was decided that car accident compensation claims and personal injury cases be removed. Continue reading

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Legal aid – an overview

An overview of legal aid ?

Legal aid is essentially the Government funded resource to enable access to justice in civil and criminal law cases where otherwise, due to financial circumstances, the recipient would not have that access.

The Legal Aid system is now run by the Legal Services Commission (LSC) which awards franchises to firms of solicitors who apply for this status and meet the LSC’s quality standards which are monitored. Consequently, if a law firm does not have a franchise, which should be clear on all marketing materials such as website, it cannot provide legal aid advice.

The overall legal aid budget is currently in the order of £2 billion per year but this is subject to current plans for some very significant reductions which are being significantly opposed.

The legal aid system has been in place for just over 60 years.

Typical cases where legal aid may be available

Legal aid is available for most types of civil and criminal cases, subject to a financial eligibility and legal merits assessment. It is only available for legal matters where without it, there could be a miscarriage of justice and a pressing legal need. Consequently, it is not available for legal work such as conveyancing or making a will.

Some examples of typical uses of legal aid are :-

  • housing law cases such as defending an application for eviction
  • consumer law cases such as issues with sale of goods or supply of services
  • Representation at court
  • Divorce and family law, including issues such as domestic violence and child custody
  • Negligence claims such as personal injury generally or medical or professional negligence
  • Some aspects of employment law although not full employment tribunal representation
  • Criminal proceedings including police station representation and at court
  • Human Rights issues

The means and merits test

Legal aid is not free and the traditional description of it is as a loan not a gift. In other words, if you obtain legal aid and win your case, and your legal costs are not fully met by the losing party, you will need to possibly repay some or all of the damages you receive back to the legal aid board. In some circumstances where you are not claiming damages, you will be liable to repay the LSC at some stage in the future when you have the means to do so.

Financial means (the eligibility test)

Under the current rules, you will be eligible to legal aid if you are receiving :-

 

  • income support
  • income-related Employment and Support Allowance
  • income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance
  • guarantee credit part of Pension Credit.

 

If you have an income, it will depend firstly on your overall income, including your partners, being less than the current level of £2,657.00 gross per month. If your combined income is over that level, you are not eligible for legal aid. If your income is less than this figure but your disposable income is more than £733.00 per month, again you are ineligible. The best and easiest way to calculate this is by using the tool on the Ministry of Justice website,  www.justice.gov.uk.

In addition, you may be ineligible because you have too much capital as well as income. If you have more than £8,000.00 whether as cash, valuable items or equity in your home you will not qualify. As mentioned above, if you do qualify for legal aid and have to repay your legal costs and own your own house, this can result in the LSC obtaining what is known as a statutory charge over your home until you repay what you owe.

As this article is a brief overview, we do not deal with all of the above in major detail. We will post articles on various aspects in more detail, but you will always need to check the position with a  legal aid firm. The figures stated above are current at the time of this note but will inevitably change so will also need to be rechecked for current accuracy.

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