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Mr. David Lock (Wyre Forest): Does my hon. Friend agree that society pays a much higher price for three reasons? First, the strain on unsuccessful litigants is appalling--their hopes are raised, then dashed. Secondly, sparse NHS resources are tied up in defending unmeritorious claims. Thirdly, doctors pursued by such unmeritorious claims are developing defensive medicine, involving unnecessary tests and investigations, to avoid such litigation--thereby wasting further sparse NHS resources, which could be better used on treating the next patient in the queue.
Mr. Hoon: My hon. Friend makes the point much better than I have laboured to do, and I entirely agree with his observation.
Mr. Brady: The Minister clearly feels that a 17 per cent. chance of success is not reasonable. What percentage would he regard as reasonable?
Mr. Hoon: I assume that the hon. Gentleman does not agree with my analysis, which disappoints me. I should have thought that a reasonable prospect of success was at least 50 per cent., but, as he will know, the Lord Chancellor has indicated that we should have a still stricter test. I am perfectly willing to concede that, had the existing test been operated successfully and had legal aid supported only cases with a reasonable prospect of success, the proposed changes would not have been necessary. We could then have relied more on the judgment of lawyers than we are able to, and that is why we are proposing a stricter merit test for the granting of legal aid.
Mr. Grieve: I am most grateful for the Minister's willingness to follow this line and to have a dialogue. By their very nature, medical negligence claims have always proved to be exceptionally difficult, and that is why the proportion of success is so low. I should be interested to hear how the generality of personal injury litigation has operated under the legal aid system, as I think I am right in saying that it pays for itself.
Mr. Hoon: The generality of personal injury litigation is clearly a success story with regard to legal aid. Nevertheless, its cost to the taxpayer is still about £75 million, so work could still be done to reduce the costs of that success story.
Mr. Corbyn: May I take my hon. Friend back to the question of medical negligence cases? In my experience,
many people who go through terrible pain after an alleged failure by a hospital and who seek legal aid to get redress are challenged by the Legal Aid Board and do not get it. Therefore, they cannot pursue the case. In many legal aid cases, there is almost a conspiracy, as medical superiors get together to stop any real pressure on the health service or on doctors in negligence cases. The very threat of legal action can improve hospital procedures, and militating against it--as my hon. Friend appears to be doing--will lead to the covering up of medical neglect in hospitals.
Mr. Hoon: My hon. Friend makes a good point about the operation of the legal system, and clearly the threat of litigation ensures that agencies in society behave properly. However, I am not sure that his case is assisted by the statistics that I have set out. With so many cases producing no return for plaintiffs, it is clear that the taxpayer is supporting a considerable number of unmeritorious actions.
Mr. Corbyn: My hon. Friend has been most kind in giving way. What studies has his Department done on medical negligence and the ways of resolving these problems? In various disputes around the country, poor people do not seem to get a hearing--if one is rich, one gets a hearing; if one is poor, one does not.
Mr. Hoon: I entirely accept my hon. Friend's proposition, if not his conclusion. It is important that we work with our colleagues in the Department of Health to ensure that cases are conducted satisfactorily, but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wyre Forest (Mr. Lock) said, it is not simply the costs that are a problem. The harsh fact is that injured people, sometimes children, are dragging their way through the courts and the misery of litigation--often for years--and, in the end, nothing is achieved for them. Meanwhile, money that could have been spent on the care of the sick and the injured is being gobbled up in legal aid. I am sure that my hon. Friend will agree with that analysis.
My officials are in contact with a large range of interests, covering consumers, the less well-off, lawyers, insurers and others. In due course, we shall issue a consultation paper, covering both the extension of conditional fees and their substitution for legal aid. We hope to be in a position to bring orders before the House in the first half of next year, giving effect to our policies on those points.
That is our vision of legal aid. Contrast that with the current scheme, in which the cost has tripled to £671 million in seven years, spending has outstripped inflation and the number of acts of help has gone down by 39,000. Legal aid should be helping more people, not fewer. Down that road there is no prospect of, say, extending legal aid to public interest cases, or of providing representation in the more complex benefits or employment cases.
Instead, we can create new and better ways to provide legal help. We can respond to local and community needs. We can ensure that the central objective will be to use the law to enable people to secure their place in society. We shall have a world where the law will play its proper part in providing the poor and the excluded with a hand up, so
that they are better placed to look after themselves and their families, and to play a full part within their communities.
In my travels around the country to see what services could be made available to meet people's needs, I visited the Catholic housing aid service in Huddersfield and the Chesterfield law centre. While I was there, I met some of the dedicated people who are working to provide advice and assistance to those in most need. Despite their efforts, and those of many others working in this area throughout the country, it is clear that there is still a significant unmet need--that people with good causes and real problems are falling through the net, unable to enforce the rights to which we should all have access. The provision of advice and assistance is fragmented and, as a result, there is a lack of consistency or effective geographical coverage. Carlisle law centre tells us that it gets people coming in from Barrow, and even from Scotland, seeking help that it is unable to give.
It was as a result of our awareness of the problems that our manifesto made a commitment to develop a community legal service. I know that that is a subject which has aroused a great deal of interest, and many people both inside and outside the Chamber would welcome details of how we intend to fulfil this commitment--the creation of a community legal service.
I am sure that hon. Members will all have their own ideas of what such a service might provide--telephone helplines, education in rights and obligations, legal advice on the internet, referrals to alternative dispute resolution, legal representation in tribunals, access to a group of salaried lawyers, interactive kiosks in every high street giving information about the legal system and the law, training in dispute resolution skills and access to judges by video link. I could go on, but those are just some of the ideas that have been put to us. We know that there are more that are worth exploring.
We are determined to identify the ideas that offer the best opportunities to provide services more effectively to a wider group than can be helped by the current system. To do that, we have to start with an open mind--we have to start by listening. Among hon. Members here today, there is a wealth of experience from constituency surgeries of the kind of problems that a community legal service might attempt to resolve. I should welcome any ideas that hon. Members might have--however novel, however radical.
I am able to tell the House that a specific project team has been set up in my Department to help us take that work forward. It is already receiving letters every day from an enormous range of people and from large and small organisations throughout the country, expressing enthusiasm for the project and a desire to participate in it. We shall be meeting those people and organisations in the coming months, to hear what they have to tell us and to explore what they think a community legal service ought to do. We believe that that is the best way to achieve a community legal service that will truly meet the needs of the community.
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