Bonfire of the quangos

Another review and another nail banged into the coffin of the Legal Services Commission (LSC). This time it is a damaging report from House of Commons’ public accounts committee which last week accused the LSC of “poor oversight” and “uncertainty and duplication” between its role and that of the Ministry of Justice (MoJ). Before Christmas another watchdog, the National Audit Office, blamed the beleaguered body for allowing lawyers to “exploit” legal aid and over-paying them £25m.

This provides the background for Sir Ian Magee’s review of the “delivery” of legal aid presently with ministers. It’s hard to resist the analysis that, if Labour doesn’t bin the LSC first, then should the Tories win the election, it will go straight on the top of their “bonfire of the quangos”.

So how should legal aid lawyers view the passing of an agency that has come to be their bête noire? “Scrapping the LSC” entails a number of possible outcomes.