Evidence submitted by Pierce Glynn Solicitors
(LAR 169)
Thank you for agreeing to speak to me on Monday.
I am writing, as agreed, to ask whether the committee would come
to our firm, in order that they can see and understand the nature
of our work, and meet the solicitors providing it. I am asking
this, as it appears to us that the work we do will not survive
the Carter inspired reforms, and therefore part of the decision
making process should be to see what type of work would no longer
be viable, before it is abolished.
I am a partner in a firm which specialises in
housing, community care and social security work, together with
public law primarily in those fields. The firm has been established
for nine years. The firm was set up by the founding partners to
deal with clients with more complex social welfare problems, as
their experience was that those who were most disadvantaged in
society tended to have a matrix of problems across these areas
of law, which needed to be tackled in a holistic way. Over those
nine years, the firm has—with, hitherto, the encouragement
of the DCA and the LSC—brought together a group of leading
practitioners in these fields, to form a team of experts able
to deal with the most difficult cases.
Preponderantly, we undertake difficult cases
for difficult clients. It is in the nature of this work that our
average costs per case are greatly in excess of the national or
local average costs per case in these areas of law. This is best
demonstrated by example. A typical average rent arrears possession
case will involve an interview with a client in the office, investigation
of their financial circumstances, resolution of outstanding housing
benefit issues, and a negotiated settlement with the landlord.
A more typical rent arrears possession case for our firm is that
of Mr C, who is a discharged mental patient living in the community,
who refuses to engage with any services, and who is refusing to
pay his rent, albeit that he is not so unwell as to require detention
under the Mental Health Act: his housing association landlord
propose to evict him; the social worker has given up trying to
assist him, and his conduct is beginning to cause a nuisance to
his neighbours. For Mr C to retain his home requires the solicitor
to make home visits, to gather evidence about his means which
he refuses to divulge, over time to seek to win his confidence,
to negotiate with family members, to take legal action to compel
the social services department to assume management of his finances,
as well as conducting a defence of possession proceedings in court.
The work can be challenging: a possession case in which I have
recently been instructed, required me to visit the severely disabled,
mentally-ill client, in her house, the inside of which was covered
in dogs' excrement. Seeing the client in these circumstances was
difficult, made more so by the presence in the house of her violent
son.
The reason that our average costs per case are
high is because the type of cases we do require more work. There
is a strong correlation between the degree of a client's disadvantage—the
extent to which they are unable to help themselves—and the
complexity and intractability of their problems. It concerns us
that this fundamental phenomenon is not recognised by Lord Carter,
the DCA and the LSC. Lord Falconer's message is that fixed fees
and competitive tendering will bring down the cost of cases by
generating greater efficiencies. There no evidence of the existence
of systemic inefficiencies in social welfare law, but further,
this perspective exhibits a complete misunderstanding of the nature
of our work.
It is difficult in Social Welfare Law, unlike
in Criminal Law, to create minimum standards of action in a case.
The same client, with the same problem, seeing a worker at a CAB
and a specialist solicitor, will receive a different service.
Expert solicitors will be pro-active in their work, which may
in turn lead to more work being done on a case, and a better result
obtained. This may ultimately save money, as the client then doesn't
have many repeat visits for repeat problems, although this result
is accomplished with fewer "acts of assistance". In
Mr C's case above, the extra work produces a viable and stable
means of sustaining his life in the community, without which he
might end up on the streets, then placed in temporary accommodation,
possibly resorting to offending, or more probably re-admitted
to hospital—all of which involve the state in heavy revenue
expenditure. Not all clients require such expert advice, and at
best the referral mechanisms working between agencies allow clients
to be referred on to the level of solicitor / advice worker that
they require. Unlike Criminal Law firms, specialist Social Welfare
firms such as ours do not do the straightforward case. It is not
a good use of our expertise.
Although I would anticipate the LSC do know
and understand the nature of our work they have made clear to
us that we should change the way we work in order that we can
survive the proposed reforms. On two separate occasions, our LSC
contract manager has advised us to consider appointing unqualified
staff to undertake basic casework so as to drive down our average
costs. We are unconvinced about the usefulness of unqualified
staff to provide advice without intensive supervision. Too often,
we have picked up the pieces of cases after such advice by other
suppliers. The number of cheaper cases required to bring down
our average costs to a level at which we could begin to bid competitively
in a "market" for legal services, would be vast. It
is therefore not economically feasible for us to go down this
route. What we are good at is providing good quality advice and
representation to the most disadvantaged groups in our society.
If this is no longer what the government chooses to pay for, then
we will close down.
Nowhere in the documents circulated by Carter
or the DCA have I seen any commitment to the high quality work
we do for some of the most vulnerable people in society. Instead,
the emphasis is all on the number of acts of assistance undertaken,
and reducing average costs. The peer review system is praised,
but it is to be handed over to the Law Society, such that the
LSC will cease to have to consider quality of work in deciding
what services to pay for. The enhancements by which specialists
can be compensated, are now routinely being disallowed; the right
of challenge to such decisions at a review hearing has been removed;
and the published CLAC contract emphasises only the need for numerous
small acts of assistance.
It is little wonder that the solicitors employed
here are considering their positions. All of our employed solicitors
could have entered top City firms, had they not been socially-motivated
to accept the much lower pay, and poorer working conditions we
are able to offer. It is of enormous concern to me that the devaluation
of their contribution, the discounting of the difficult and stressful
work they do, will lead to their seeking employment elsewhere—outside
the social welfare field. If this happens I doubt that such expertise
could be re-created.
I have tried to keep this email fairly brief,
but I do hope that I can persuade you and the committee to come
to speak to us, and to see for themselves what the government
is funding through this firm, and what it—and more importantly
our vulnerable clients—stand to lose if the proposed reforms
go ahead.
October 2006
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