The Legal Aid Agency (LAA) has published a business plan for 2018-19.  The strap line reads: working with others to achieve excellence in the delivery of legal aid – it’s a promising start.  In the financial year to come, the LAA have stated that they remain committed to delivering more efficient services to society, the public and legal aid providers. To help achieve this they are aiming to be a simpler and smarter organisation.

In our previous blog article 5 Intriguing Key Strategic Objectives For The Legal Aid Agency 2017-2018 we examined the LAA Strategic Objectives over the past year. The LAA will continue to benchmark any progress against these key objectives which are to:

1.Provide Simple, timely and reliable access to legal aid

The LAA are still committed to providing access to legal aid for those whose life and liberty is at stake, where they face the loss of their home, in domestic violence cases, and where children are taken into care.

The LAA hope to achieve this by:

• Processing 80% of applications for civil legal aid within 20 working days and 90% of applications for criminal legal aid within 2 working days
• Paying 90% of completed and accurate Bills within 20 working days
• Implementing new civil face to face contracts and
• Meeting rigorous targets for customer service and timeliness of response to correspondence

Given that the LAA already achieved above and beyond the application and payment targets in the 2017/18 financial year, we would be keen to see it step up and push the boundaries further in this new financial year

2.Build strong relationships across Government and the Justice system

The LAA state they wish to create an effective and fair justice system which would serve all users. More importantly and a positive step by the LAA is that they have a willingness to work with their partners across the justice system to respond to the findings of the LASPO post-implementation review.

The LAA will measure this objective by:

• Progressing with the Agency Transformation Programme of simplification and automation which by 2020 will help to better deliver legal aid
• Respond to the findings of the Lammy Review and the LASPO Post-Implementation Review (watch this space)
  3. Secure value for money for the taxpayer in all that they do

During the next year the LAA will continue to exercise careful financial stewardship of the Legal Aid Fund undertaking effective contract management as the whole process becomes simpler and more streamlined.

The LAA will measure this objective by:

• Closely monitoring Fund and Admin Spend
• Maintaining a net error rate below 1%

As the LAA managed to achieve a net error rate below 1% in the previous financial year a near 0% error rate would have been a more challenging target.

4. Achieve full potential through being fair, proud and supportive

During 2018/19 the LAA hope to attract and retain a diverse range of people and continue to use the MOJ values to set high expectations of behaviour.

The LAA will hope to achieve this by:

• Delivering apprenticeships, the Skills Development Programme and the Leadership Potential Programme.
• Maintaining staff engagement and fairness & inclusion scores in the annual Civil Service People Survey.

Is retention of staff an issue at the LAA?

5. Digitalisation

CCMS still has a long way to go to ensure its reliability during working hours. The LAA pledge that they are going to reduce the amount of re-work by completing more cases in one pass and also they will be increasing the number of online communications. This will hopefully have the desired effect of speeding up the entire process from initial application, queries and payment of the final bill and is to be warmly encouraged.

Conclusion

The LAA is already meeting a large number  of the targets re-set in this “business plan” and whilst writing  – just when did the Legal Aid Agency become a “business” as opposed to a provider of access to justice for those in need?

The most positive plan for the next year is in relation to responding to the findings of the LASPO post-implementation review, and this is where the LAA can really listen and respond to the issues that most affect all Legal Aid Providers.

We will keep you updated!

To find out more about John M Hayes and how outsourcing your legal costing requirements can benefit your company call us today on 0370 300 3780 or email info@johnmhayes.co.uk.

Alternatively see our website for a full range of our legal aid services.