Latimer Hinks withdrew from legal aid work in 1998 and numerous other firms across the country have taken the same step. Resolution, the solicitors family law group, has warned that new fixed fees for family legal aid work published today by the Ministry of Justice are likely to mean a further exodus of lawyers from family legal aid and so undermine access to justice for ordinary families.

The new fees represent a further cut in legal aid remuneration at a time when family legal aid is already in crisis. The number of family legal aid practices in the country has dramatically dropped, from 4,500 in 2000 to 2,800 in 2006.

“The potential of these new fees to cause substantial and long term damage to the provision of family legal aid for separating families has been grossly underestimated,” said David Emmerson, Chair of Resolution’s Legal Aid Committee, strongly urging the government to reconsider the fees for private law cases before they come into effect in October 2010, “Some of these fees represent a cut of more than 40 percent to hourly rates that have already remained static for the last ten years. Faced with this uneconomic scenario there is a very real danger that firms will walk away from legal aid work, further undermining access to justice.”

Lawyers estimate that for a very simple child contact case taking around 14 hours a legal aid firm would currently receive £960 on the basis of the hourly rate. The new fixed fee would be just £471 a cut of more than 50 percent.

Similarly a legal aid firm managing a straightforward divorce finance case which goes to full hearing, would be paid £2,106 at present; this will reduce to £1,299 under the new fixed fee regime, a cut of almost 40 percent.