A missed opportunity to make health, education and social support savings through investment in early justice interventions

In the UK, around 14 million people live in poverty and can’t afford access to justice and two-thirds of the population do not know how to get legal advice.

Research is clear that legal issues intersect with health, housing, employment, discrimination and income, and that problems compound if unresolved. This is heightened for people experiencing mental health issues, disability and domestic abuse.

The research also that tells us that the disadvantaged who are suffering most, are also more likely to have not only one legal problem, but between five and eleven.

Those who miss out on early legal support, tailored to their needs, are more likely to end up in court, take longer to resolve their legal problems and are unlikely to be satisfied with the outcomes, leading to increased distrust.

In this respect, October’s Budget was disappointing for anyone interested in improving access to justice. The monies, while needed, are limited in use for the prisons’ crisis and criminal courts, at the ambulatory end, rather than early intervention in civil issues, which address poverty, including housing eviction and homelessness, domestic abuse and safety, income support, debt etc. All of which entrench the inequalities mentioned above.

There is hope, but policy and funding courage is needed.

Funding for the justice sector

A recent Access to Justice Foundation, Pragmatix and Bar Council report (by Munro and Preece) concludes:

‘Long-term savings are significant, as for every ½ million people in receipt of free specialist legal advice, our central scenario suggests a saving to Treasury of £11.2 billion over the next ten years.’ (Page 8)

A range of studies suggest that much of the money allocated to the justice sector could be more effective if spent on earlier interventions that are integrated with services people already turn to for help.

For example, the elderly pensioner wrongly pursued by debt collectors. She is anxious and stressed and feels pressured to pay. This causes her health to deteriorate. However, if she is already trusting her nurse (a ‘trusted intermediary’) whose legal capability has been enhanced through a model where legal services sit alongside health and social services in one place, then she is more likely to disclose her problem and get the help she needs. Her debt might be expunged and her housing and other multiple issues identified early and resolved.

If her problems are not resolved, we know from research it not only leads to increased costs to the justice system, but also to other government departments, such as health.

Currently, very little research is done on the outcomes of expenditure on legal aid and how it improves lives. Rather, the focus is on how to do less and spend less, so delivering people-centred justice outcomes are missed. There is a mismatch between what the research says is a wise investment.

Instead, what we have in the UK is a referral roundabout due to the fragmented and siloed, largely privatised or ‘contracted out’, service delivery, which is inefficient, overly bureaucratic, unduly costly and unsustainable. People are sent from pillar to post, which often doesn’t deliver outcomes and causes them to give up, especially as too often they are referred by agencies to services that no longer exist or are beyond capacity.

There are pockets of good practice and innovation around the UK being exhibited by grassroots services, for example law centres. These services struggle to find ways to innovate in very difficult and challenging circumstances, but they and the community agencies they work with are stretched, exhausted and under-resourced and poorly supported.

Too often funding is short term and the ability to have an impact and become trusted is impossible due to uncertainty and insecurity. Time which should be spent on service to the community is directed to multiple funding applications for small amounts of money, or pilot and project funding, and multiple accountability and compliance requirements.

Going forward

In the next three years, I will be documenting and benchmarking good practice to focus on what works rather than what does not, and to find out what leads to improvements in people’s lives.

There is sparse research into good models, so these pockets of good practice in the UK remain underexplored and are not shared when they could be replicated in other regions and adjusted to service local communities.

With core and consistent funding, services can recruit and retain good staff and build the connections, reach and engagement and legal capability.

The model I propose is not based on the ‘problem type’ (requiring people to identify a problem as legal when they are not a legal expert) or which service has the legal aid contract in different and often distant locations, which can require the telling of a story over and over that is retraumatising or money or ability to travel.

It is ‘people-centred’ in its design, ensuring those currently missing out can find joined-up responses with a range of services. Based on my international research into best practice I recommend:

• Community-based placement of models utilising existing organisations with a track record of being local, trusted and responsive, rather than funding new services and entrants who may be large scale and monopolistic;
• Co-locate different services, which have shared values and specifically work with different groups that include health, allied health social and justice services, specifically law centres which have the non-hierarchical modes of private practise and approachability and interpersonal skills in dealing with vulnerable groups that are often lacking in traditional law firm models. My research indicates that the traditional model can be alienating to both professionals outside of the legal industry and clients;
• ‘No wrong door’ policy, once people have passed a realistic means test, assessment and triage can occur within the one stop co-located service;
• Harnessing of the borrowed trust between the different professionals that might mean a more holistic response to multiple and varied problems that intersect and cascade across different disciplines such as law, health, cultural, social and economics; and
• Core public funding of law centres rather than the current fragmented, siloed costly model, providing the following:
• information;
• advice;
• community development;
• the development of peer-to-peer groups to enable connection, reduce social isolation and enable members of the community to build on the learning that they have through the community developed model mentioned above;
• professional development training of different professionals across disciplines to build legal capability to ensure services reach more people and secondary consultation;
• advocacy on policy and legislation to improve this where problematic trends are uncovered in casework; and
• representation before tribunals and courts, e.g., housing, pensions, debt etc.

I have a very good idea of what works in practice and have seen these first hand in Australia and Canada. While they too have fiscal constraints, they seem able do more, often with a lot less. Now I work and live in the UK, I am astounded at how the legal service system and profession is letting down our community.

In the UK, the new government can seize what is good and build on this. It can learn how we can develop an improved service system to enable more people-centred justice that leads to improved outcomes for people.

It has the opportunity to take away the shackles of ideology and band-aid solutions to a legal support system that has been haemorrhaging for some time. I am very deliberately using medical terms here, because too often the focus has been on the NHS, when with earlier intervention and problem-solving people would not end up in dire straits, including suffering from poor health.

The current state threatens trust and confidence in our systems and the legitimacy of the state. This is an issue that cuts across all portfolios – the Ministries of Justice, Treasury, Health, Education etc.

It demands the joint commitment of all departments and requires the will, energy, conviction and effort to ensure positive outcomes in people’s lives. There must be greater effort to hold onto what is good and works and let go of what has been for too long shown to be inefficient, ineffective, unresponsive, disillusioning and blunt.

Dr Liz Curran is Associate Professor and Research Impact Lead Nottingham Law School, Nottingham Trent University and Honorary Associate Professor, College of Law Australian National University. She has worked as a community lawyer and in policy and advocacy for NGOs, legal aid and legal centres. She is on the board of a law centre in the UK.

Read Dr Curran’s submission to the Parliamentary Health and Social Care Committee.