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24 March 2011
Issue: 7458 / Categories: Legal News
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LAG disputes MoJ figures

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Proposed impact of civil legal aid cuts “based on out of date figures”

The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) has understated the numbers potentially hit by the proposed cuts to legal aid by more than 150,000, the Legal Action Group (LAG) has claimed.

LAG cross-checked the data presented by the MoJ in its impact assessment after being alerted by the director of the Law Centres Federation that figures for social welfare law cases were higher using the 2009/10 case data than the 2008/09 data on which the MoJ estimates were based.

LAG claims that by using the older data, the MoJ has understated the reach of its cuts. It re-assessed the figures and concluded that 653,659 people would lose out on legal advice services as opposed to the MoJ’s estimate of 502,000.

Steve Hynes, director of LAG, said: “LAG believes that the MoJ has been guilty of playing rather fast and loose in its interpretation of the figures on the impact of the proposed civil legal aid cuts.

“Our research shows that 30%more people than the government

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