Can someone explain what the Minister O'Callaghan - Law Society standoff is all about?

[trajan]

Under the old system we are told that solicitors operating a client under legal aid would get ~ €240 for the first court appearance and around €60 for each appearance thereafter. I don't know how many appearances would be demanded by a typical case. But the fact that the new system is pitched at €520 per client regardless of the number of appearances suggests that 4 or 5 should cover most. On the other hand, the resistance of the Law Society to this new plan suggests that the number of appearances would be higher. I say the latter as I believe that Irish solicitors would otherwise support the new scheme as it would resolve a typical case with less appearances and this should be advantageous to a solicitor wanting to spend more time in their office.

On my few experiences within the district courts of Ireland (all minimal, benign and mandatory, I assure AAM members) I was often struck by the ease with which solicitors obtained adjournments by trotting out the usual excuses like clients being sick or a large number of similar cases occurring on the desired adjournment date. Judges raised eyebrows from time to time but the solicitor's request was always granted. I wonder would an appearance at court requesting an adjournment be offered as an appearance by a solicitor ? If so every day the state is losing N times €60 unnecessarily. Maybe M times N times €60 if that solicitor has M clients for whom he seeks an adjournment . . . when of course the appearance overhead should be split among the number of clients represented similarly, i.e. (N/M) times €60.

Can anyone enlighten us as to what constitutes a solicitor's appearance in court ? Perhaps Jim O'Callaghan and his civil servants had a similar problem and seek to resolve it with the new system of legal aid payments.

 

[Purple]

The issue is that if someone was up on 20 charges as a single sitting some solicitors were charging for 20 appearances. That said the problems with the legal industry are far bigger than this and it all seems a bit tokenistic.

 

[trajan]

The issue is that if someone was up on 20 charges as a single sitting some solicitors were charging for 20 appearances.

Under recent changes by the Department of Justice, solicitors representing clients in the District Court receive a flat fee of €520 per case, rather than being paid per court appearance or for multiple offences. -- Google AI

But it's appearance based, not charge based - both under the old & new systems. It's the one-off fee the solicitors are bugged by.

Does anyone here know the average number of appearances put in by legal aid solicitors on a typical criminal case ? That - and the reasons therefor - seems to be the crux of this conundrum.

That said the problems with the legal industry are far bigger than this and it all seems a bit tokenistic.

If a minister can't win the small battles using court efficiency, how can he/she win a major battle to overhaul the Law Society or the Bar ?

 

[mathepac]

I've never understood the need for repeated appearances in court and repeated adjournments. Surely both sides can agree between themselves that they have their cases ready and make a joint written, or, God between us and all harm, online application to the court's office for a hearing date to which the both agree online. What am I missing here, apart from a thirst for appearance fees, appearance fees, and more appearance fees?

 

[Purple]

What am I missing here, apart from a thirst for appearance fees, appearance fees, and more appearance fees?

You're not missing anything.

 

[Purple]

But it's appearance based, not charge based - both under the old & new systems. It's the one-off fee the solicitors are bugged by.

Yes, but the accusation has been made that it is not uncommon for solicitors to apply for costs based on each charge. It's not straightforward as the same client could be called separately a number of times in a single court session. If a solicitor was getting paid once for 5 charges if the client stayed standing or 5 times for 5 charges if the client sat down then stood up again between charges then, obviously, they'll have them playing musical chairs.

 

[odyssey06]

If the solicitor has to prepare for 5 charges is that not more work than 1 charge?
Obviously there'd be more work if each charge was a different sitting, but still.

 

[peemac]

Half the issue is the amount of court time taken with multiple appearances and the casual nature of getting adjournments

This new system, in theory, should speed up issues as it is hoped cases come to a conclusion quicker now that there's no incentive to have multiple appearances.

Lets just say it was rather easy to milk the system on the "per appearance" fee, but more efficient solicitors will likely do better from the new system.


Some day the legal system will enter the 20th century. - lets leave the 21st century aside til then

 

[Purple]

If the solicitor has to prepare for 5 charges is that not more work than 1 charge?
Obviously there'd be more work if each charge was a different sitting, but still

Not if it's for 5 adjournments.

 

[trajan]

And we haven't even mentioned casual €20 one-off fees to court staff for mysterious reasons.

Or maybe they've gone up to €50 now . . .

 

[MOB]

I and many, many solicitors like me have been on the legal aid panel for years despite rarely doing legal aid work. There may well have been some careful optimisation or gaming of the present legal aid system by some solicitors. That cost seems to have irked the civil servants and the present Minister. That cost, whatever it was, needed to be balanced against the subsidy that I, and hundreds of colleagues just like me, willingly gave to the public purse. It never ever made economic sense for me to go to a Garda station when a suspect in custody needed a solicitor(and when none of the legal aid 'regulars' was available).

It never made economic sense to go to court for a legal aid client as I would be there for just the one case, thanks to the policy of closing rural courts (and I rarely did - but here's the thing, when the alternative was that a client of the office would be left without a solicitor, off I went to waste a day hanging round the court).

I did it because it is regarded in my profession as a duty. Not by everybody, certainly, but by hundreds of solicitors nonetheless.

Whether the changes are right or wrong, it is 100% the case that they were imposed with no real dialogue. So, I and many of my colleagues are done.

The sooner we have properly resourced public defenders the better. In the meantime, there is plenty of fault to go round and the current crisis is 100% down to the Minister and his civil servants.

 

[trajan]

@MOB

Thanks for providing a solicitor's perspective.

To what extent your category of occasional legal aid solicitor would get a hearing in putative consultations with the minister versus the noisy fat-cats of city courts who often do little else bar FLA criminal cases, I do not know. I wouldn't be surprised if you were Paretoed out of serious consideration by Dept of Justice administrators due to the scale of your FLA work.

I take your point about rural courts. I suppose 'efficiency' would have been one of the excuses for the reduction in these - efficiency in arranging judge rotas as much as for FLA solicitors.

 

[MOB]

I wouldn't be surprised if you were Paretoed out of serious consideration by Dept of Justice administrators due to the scale of your FLA work.

I would be very surprised. Your point is in substance correct, but not because they consciously ignored or discounted the ( let's call it) 80% of practitioners who collect (let's say) 20% of criminal legal aid fees while performing a public service at a loss. They simply didn't think about it. At all. They have literally no idea of the extent to which this creaking system is held together with spit and string. Truthfully, nor do I: there is no readily available data. However, we will have that data in the next few years.

 

[Purple]

I would be very surprised. Your point is in substance correct, but not because they consciously ignored or discounted the ( let's call it) 80% of practitioners who collect (let's say) 20% of criminal legal aid fees while performing a public service at a loss. They simply didn't think about it. At all. They have literally no idea of the extent to which this creaking system is held together with spit and string. Truthfully, nor do I: there is no readily available data. However, we will have that data in the next few years.

To what extent do you think the shortage of Judges and a corresponding desire to make more efficient use of their time is a driver in these recently imposed changes?

Is this about reducing the legal aid bill or making better and more efficient use of the resources of the District Courts?

I don't believe anyone engaged in gaming the system was paying a mortgage on the seafront in Dalkey with the proceeds. I do think that it caused a general gumming up of the courts and wasted a vast amount of Garda time.

 

[MOB]

To what extent do you think the shortage of Judges and a corresponding desire to make more efficient use of their time is a driver in these recently imposed changes?

Is this about reducing the legal aid bill or making better and more efficient use of the resources of the District

I really don't know. There are so many inefficient practices it is hard to discern an overall strategy.

Let me give a simple example of efficiency gains that could be achieved. Before a case is first in court, I must write to the prosecutor to obtain the evidence against the accused. (I don't yet know if the accused will be granted legal aid, so if they are economically marginalised and cannot pay themselves, I may end up doing this work without payment). The prosecution could give this to me before the court date. They never do. It is their policy to only provide on foot of a court order ( and I am not entitled to a court order if I have not already written asking for the evidence)

Except for those rare cases where a client wants to plead guilty immediately and is clearly able to understand all the consequences, the first day in court is an avoidable waste of time. This waste, baked into every single legally aided case, could be abolished at the stroke of a pen.

I won't miss this work.

 

[Purple]

I really don't know. There are so many inefficient practices it is hard to discern an overall strategy.

Great example.

Why so interim care orders last for 8 weeks in the UK and only 4 weeks here?

I was in court with a family member a few years back. It was a single charge but could have been serious. The person involved was 18 at the time. The Gardai were superb. They regarded it as a mental health issue and were trying to ensure the DPP did the same thing. There were 8 adjournments over more than a year. The Probation Act was used. Great outcome. Could have been done in 15 minutes the first day.

 

[trajan]

Before a case is first in court, I must write to the prosecutor to obtain the evidence against the accused. (I don't yet know if the accused will be granted legal aid, so if they are economically marginalised and cannot pay themselves, I may end up doing this work without payment). The prosecution could give this to me before the court date. They never do. It is their policy to only provide on foot of a court order ( and I am not entitled to a court order if I have not already written asking for the evidence)

Never knew it was as shayte as this. Providing defence counsel with book of evidence should be automatic and in enough time for defence to prepare without having to go to court and ask for a deferral to enable BoE study.

I am surprised someone doesn't set up an association of criminal defence attorneys and lobby for this.

Maybe we need wide-ranging public consultation on reform of courts and court practices rather than the patch-her-ups we're getting over the years. Judges will resist anything that gives them a giddy-up. But judges aren't the only ones in this process.

 

[MOB]

Providing defence counsel with book of evidence

It is not quite that formal in the District Court, though the substance is much the same. A copy of prosecution statements/summary of evidence plus any available cctv is usually what we get- often the evidence is just the statements of arresting garda and a custody record.

 

[MOB]

Could have been done in 15 minutes the first day.

Without prying, this sounds like a case that could potentially have gone to the Circuit court, and the guards were awaiting DPP directions? If so, there is a process and there are checks and balances built in. Yes, there are also delays. But the process would definitely take longer than one court appearance. And even if the DPP consented to summary disposal ( i.e. District Court) the judge could decline jurisdiction and kick it upstairs. Glad your relative got a good outcome.

More generally, for many people on the economic and societal margin, the court is a place where you are in theory equal. It is often the only place that marginalised people get to engage with the system from a position of having someone in their corner (even if your corner wants to throw in the towel right away, it is not without some dignity). There is a significant social-work aspect to this. Not an argument in favour of waste and inefficiency - but a 15 minute single day process is not necessarily optimal either.

 

[Purple]

Without prying, this sounds like a case that could potentially have gone to the Circuit court, and the guards were awaiting DPP directions? If so, there is a process and there are checks and balances built in. Yes, there are also delays. But the process would definitely take longer than one court appearance. And even if the DPP consented to summary disposal ( i.e. District Court) the judge could decline jurisdiction and kick it upstairs. Glad your relative got a good outcome.

Yes, that's close to what happened. The Garda involved requested adjournments until, as he put it, we got the right judge. Over the course of a few years dealing with mental health and addiction problems which involved the Gardai on a number of occasions I was completely blown away by how caring and compassionate the Gardai were.

More generally, for many people on the economic and societal margin, the court is a place where you are in theory equal. It is often the only place that marginalised people get to engage with the system from a position of having someone in their corner (even if your corner wants to throw in the towel right away, it is not without some dignity). There is a significant social-work aspect to this. Not an argument in favour of waste and inefficiency - but a 15 minute single day process is not necessarily optimal either.

The greatest saving that could b made in the District Court would be the decriminalisation of possession of class A drugs for personal use. We don't criminalise other forms of addiction and giving broken and dysfunctional people who are addicts a criminal record it an exercise in utter futility. Thinking that a custodial sentence to an addict and thinking it will stop them feeling their addiction is even more pointless.