Proposed changes to legal aid commented on by stakeholders
21st September 2018
The Legal Aid Review
Panel set up to review changes to Jersey’s legal aid system has requested and
published evidence from key stakeholders. The evidence is in response to
proposed changes to the legal aid system, which includes eligibility criteria
(i.e. household earnings) and the way that legal aid is delivered by the legal
profession.
The Panel started
work in July 2018 and during the first part of its review, has gathered
evidence from key stakeholders including the Law Society, the Bâtonnier and the
Citizens Advice Bureau.
It has also reviewed
the draft legal aid law in detail and considered any areas where amendments
might be necessary. It is expected that the draft law to prompt suggested
changes to legal aid will be lodged by the Government in the coming weeks. The
Panel will then launch a public consultation so that members of the public can
have their say.
The amendments to
the legal aid system were originally published in February 2018 in the draftAccess to Justice (Jersey) Law. In order to allow the new States Assembly
sufficient time to consider the proposals, the draft law was withdrawn by the
Chief Minister in July 2018 and is due to be re-lodged in Autumn 2018.
Deputy Steve Ahier,
Chairman of the Legal Aid Review Panel said “Through our review, we want to
ensure that members of the public are aware of the proposed changes to the
legal aid system and have an opportunity to comment on the changes. Once the
final proposals are lodged, we will be publicising the consultation in the
media and through social media. In the meantime, we are happy to receive
comments from members of the public and interested parties via the States
Assembly website, Facebook and Twitter pages or through the scrutiny office at
scrutiny@gov.je.”
Find out more about the Legal Aid Review Panel.
Send us your comments on legal aid.
Join the
conversation on #legalaidJSY and follow @StatesAssembly on Twitter for updates
on our review.
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