SOLICITORS, BARRISTERS and other professionals working within the Criminal Legal Aid Scheme are to have their fees cut by 8 per cent.
The Department of Justice informed the Law Society yesterday that fees paid under the State scheme would be reduced from April 1st.
In a letter to the society, the department said the Minister had decided that fees, prescribed by regulation, to defence counsel and solicitors under the scheme should be reduced.
“Having regard to the particular circumstances leading to the introduction of this regulation, the usual four-month notice will be waived and solicitors who are dissatisfied with the reduction in fees will be allowed to withdraw from the solicitors’ Criminal Legal Aid panels by giving 30-days’ notice,” the letter said.
The reduction will also apply to fees payable under the Garda station legal aid and Cab schemes as well as to other professionals engaged as expert witnesses and to translation and interpretation services.
“Efforts should be made to ensure that quotations received are reasonable in terms of rates proposed and number of hours worked having regard to the circumstances of the individual case,” the letter said.
Ken Murphy, director general of the Law Society, said the 8 per cent cut comes on top of an 8 per cent cut last year and a 2.5 per cent increment, applied but then rescinded, just six months prior to that.
“This cut will further reduce the quality of service which accused persons, with rights but without financial means, will receive in our courts.
“Access to justice is not free – but a society is not free without it,” he said.
Solicitors want to contribute positively to the reductions in public expenditure and are more than willing to bear their fair share of the pain, he added.
“But the reality is that solicitors who practise on the Criminal Legal Aid panel were under severe financial pressure even before this latest cut,” he said.
“The area of practice is not lucrative and firms engaged in it have not generated reserves on which they can now draw to subsidise their practice.”
The cuts will result in further addition to the already very-high level of unemployment in the profession, Mr Murphy said.
“The current reality is one of too many solicitors, too little work and too many clients who simply cannot pay even the greatly reduced fees that firms are now offering to charge,” he added.
