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This multidisciplinary workshop will examine the effects of these cuts with a special focus on family law.
Please join us for a webinar workshop hosted by the School of Law at the University of Essex.
In April 2013, the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO) introduced cuts to legal aid. This reform resulted in a clear reduction of the overall cost of legal aid in England and Wales and, at the same time, significantly reduced the number of cases eligible for civil legal aid. The reduction of the number of cases eligible for legal aid is thought to have resulted in an equally impressive reduction of the number of individuals who actually benefit from legal aid. A 2018 Equality and Human Rights Commission Research report points out that ‘fewer people could access legal advice and representation’.
The first session will present the findings of a recent research project. Funded by the British Academy, the project uses interdisciplinary methodology to study the reality of LASPO in family courts – a reality that will also be discussed by human rights experts. The second session will give the floor to practitioners from both Essex’s Law Clinic and local firms.
Panel One: Assessing LASPO: the effects of cuts to legal aid in England and Wales
10.00 am to 11.30 am – UK BST;
Assessing LASPO: the effects of cuts to legal aid in England and Wales Dr Konstantinos Kalliris, Lecturer, School of Law, University of Essex
Dr Theodoros Alysandratos, Research Fellow in Behavioural/Experimental Economics, Nottingham Business School
The duty to provide legal aid under Article 47 EU Charter
Dr Napoleon Xanthoulis, Senior Lecturer, Portsmouth Law School
Chair: Dr Sahar Maranlou, Lecturer, School of Law, University of Essex
Panel Two: Legal Aid post LASPO – a view from practice
12.30pm to 2.00pm UK BST;
Family law – the rise in Litigants in Person Liz Fisher-Frank, Essex Law Clinic Supervisor and Lecturer, School of Law, University of Essex
Housing legal aid – where are we now? Lucy Davies, Law Clinic Supervisor (Housing) and Lecturer, School of Law, University of Essex and Legal Aid Caseworker, Suffolk Law Centre
LASPO and its impact on law firms and the profession
Tony Fisher, Senior Partner, Fisher Jones Greenwood
To join this online workshop please register at Eventbrite. Upon registration, you will be sent the webinar ID’s.
The webinar will be accessible via Zoom. Please make sure you have created a Zoom account in advance of joining the workshop, if you haven’t yet, please create an account here. If you are a University of Essex staff member or student please follow the instructions on how to create an account.
For those who cannot join this online workshop, the videos of each panel will be posted afterwards on our social media channels.
How to ask questions
Please use the Q and A box to ask your questions, the chair of each session will take a selection of questions at the end of each panel.