Mayo solicitors meet TDs to warn of 'devastating' impact of new legal aid model
CRIMINAL law solicitors practising in Mayo have met with local TDs Paul Lawless, Minister of State Alan Dillon and Rose Conway-Walsh at Leinster House to raise urgent concerns about the new model for criminal legal aid, introduced by the Department of Justice on July 1.
They warned that the scheme is already forcing solicitors off criminal legal aid panels - with knock-on effects for victims, vulnerable defendants, and the courts system in Mayo.
Cathy McDarby, criminal law solicitor at McDarby Solicitors in Ballinrobe, said: "Solicitors are resigning from the scheme in unprecedented numbers. In addition to those who have resigned from the Criminal Legal Aid panel, a large number have stopped working under the new scheme.
“A Law Society poll of 260 solicitors, who were on the Criminal Legal Aid panel in June, found that just three (out of 260) were continuing to work under the new scheme.”
Ms. McDarby added: "These changes will have a profoundly negative impact on access to justice and it’s not just solicitors saying this - groups including the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission (IHREC), the Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL), and Free Legal Advice Centres (FLAC) have all voiced concerns about the negative impact the changes will have on the justice system. We are going to have a legal desert in Mayo at this rate.
"As we have told the minister many times, the Department of Justice is replicating a model that has already proven to be a failure - in family law.
"The same approach in Civil Legal Aid (family law) drove solicitors out of this area of practice and created legal deserts, with the Legal Aid Board itself reporting it cannot maintain a consistent nationwide service. Replicating it in criminal law will predictably produce the same exodus.
"The department has designed a structure that assumes every case is the same. It isn't. A case involving a child, or someone with a serious addiction or mental health difficulty, needs far more time - more court appearances, more meetings and more patience. None of that is reflected in a flat payment."
Solicitors used the meeting to the deputies raise the matter directly with the Minister for Justice and to press for immediate engagement with the Law Society.