Latest News, Views & Current Affairs Archive Advertise with Case Load About Case Load
Members login
Email
Password
 Forgot your password?
 Join free headline alert

Big Name Pulls Legal Aid Plug

Unpopularity of legal aid work is not limited to New Zealand, where some lawyers are refusing to take on work they say is underpaid and thankless.

One the England's oldest and most prominent criminal law firms has scrapped its police prosecutions department in order to concentrate on more lucrative white-collar crime cases, Michael Herman of Times Online reports.

Irwin Mitchell, one of the country's ten biggest firms, was founded as a criminal firm but this week began a redundancy consultation with 18 staff — including solicitors, legal executives and support workers — responsible for defending suspected criminals in police-led prosecutions for crimes including robbery, assault and murder.

Founded in Sheffield in 1912, Irwin Mitchell is ranked as the number one criminal firm in the north-east by the prestigious Chambers legal directory but now generates most of its revenue from other, more commercial areas of practice.

The closure of the department will nevertheless come as a blow to the provision of legal services in the region — especially as many of the firm's clients were advised free under the Government's legal aid service.

Until just the other day the firm's website boasted: "Irwin Mitchell was founded on criminal law services, and we remain as committed now as the firm's founder was many years ago, to providing an excellent service to all clients, no matter what their background, and no matter what allegations they face."

Following calls from Times Online, the criminal law section was taken down from the site. It was later restored with the above sentence removed.

Irwin Mitchell issued a statement saying that it had been forced into reconsidering its position because of changes to the provision of legal aid. It will continue to represent legally-aided clients in white-collar criminal cases and in other areas of the law. One such client was Ann Marie Rogers, the mother who won a landmark victory to be treated with the breast cancer drug Herceptin.

The statement said: "As a committed legal aid firm that has subsidised this part of its practice for many years it has reluctantly decided that current and prospective changes in legal aid require a fundamental review of our position."

The closure will be an embarrassment for Sir Michael Napier, Irwin Mitchell’s senior partner, who was last week made an honorary QC for his contribution to pro bono legal services. As the Attorney-General's pro bono envoy he has been a champion of moves to ensure that all sections of society, especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds, have equal access to legal representation.