Recommendation 18

When this Committee looked at legal aid in 2015, it noted the lack of analysis MoJ had undertaken of the wider impacts of the reforms on itself and other government departments and stressed that MoJ needed to do more. At the time, MoJ told the Committee that it was not possible to know what the wider impact of the reforms might be outside of the Ministry. However, there were already indications at that time from organisations that costs may have shifted elsewhere. For example, a survey of GPs indicated that GPs had noticed an increase in patients who would have benefited from legal advice on social welfare issues. The number of people representing themselves in court (litigants-in- person) had also increased, but MoJ lacked reliable data on the impact of this on courts.50