More Trouble Ahead For Criminal Lawyers
The recent strike by the Criminal Bar Association has now been suspended as the government struck a deal with barristers. Unfortunately, for the sake of justice, that dispute was only the tip of the iceberg when it came to chronic underinvestment in the system.
We have already seen that today as the government announced that it was running out of prison places and was therefore activating the Operation Safeguard contingency to secure 400 police cells. Government claims that this was a result of the CBA strike rang hollow as the remand prison population was already extremely high before the strike even started.
Now it has been announced that criminal solicitors will receive a real-term cut to their fees as part of a government pay settlement. Last year the government’s own review recommended at least a 15% rise in fees but the Ministry of Justice’s extra £85 million represents only an 11% increase for the profession.
On the surface that might sound like a small difference and at least it is an increase but the Law Society (the professional body for solictors) believes that this could represent a “fatal blow to the criminal justice system”. A real-terms cut in pay means that even more criminal solicitors will leave the profession (and not be replaced by junior colleagues) over the next several years. Estimates reckon that the number of duty solicitors might fall by as much as 19% by 2025.
Does this mean strike action is on the horizon once again?
We aren’t there yet but the prospect of a strike by criminal solicitors is a much more realistic possibility today than it was yesterday. The head of the Law Society, Lubna Shuja, is clearly not very happy after she spoke to the Secretary of State for Justice, Dominic Raab, only two days ago about the important role these lawyers play. Now she says “Having seen that direct action gets results, the response from some of our members may be to resort to disruptive tactics.”
On top of this, Catherine Baksi reported that the Society is also contemplating legal action in respect of the decision.
It feels like one step forward and several steps back for the criminal justice system at the moment. By this stage even the government’s own supporters can see the cracks appearing and yet instead of remedying the situation, the steps by the government are making things exponentially worse.