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Welcome to the first edition of the AJC Newsletter. We hope you find its contents interesting and informative. We aim to bring you a round-up of the work of our various Panels and Working Groups whilst offering a platform to highlight the current areas of work being undertaken by those involved in administrative law. We welcome your feedback; contact us at ajc@justice.org.uk
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NEW MEMBERS
The Council welcomes the following new members: Lord Woolman (Scottish President of Tribunals); Kate Gregory-Smith (Ministry of Justice) and Samantha Pullin (HMRC).
The Advice Sector Panel is pleased to welcome two new members: Nicola Burgess is Legal Director at the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, and Julie Kirkby of Durham County Council will be representing NAWRA (National Association for Welfare Rights Advisors).
The Academic Panel welcomes Mike Adler, Emeritus Professor at University of Edinburgh, and Anna Steiner, Senior Lecturer at Westminster Law School and Supervising Solicitor at their Legal Advice Clinic.
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FAREWELL
Lady Anne Smith has recently retired as the President of Scottish Tribunals and also stepped down from the Council. We would like to extend our gratitude for her valued contribution to the AJC.
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'Falling through the gaps’ Webinar
The AJC hosted a webinar 'Falling through the gaps' on the Windrush Scandal on 29 September. The webinar was chaired by Robert Thomas, Professor of Public Law at Manchester University and Co-Chair of the AJC Academic Panel. Panelists included Rob Behrens (Parliamentary and Health Services Ombudsman), Helen MeGarry (Independent Reviewer to the Compensation Scheme), Martin Forde QC (Independent Advisor to the Compensation Scheme), Jacqueline McKenzie (Director at Centre for Migration Advice and Research and McKenzie Beute and Pope), Holly Stow (Windrush Compensation Scheme Paralegal, North Kensington Law Centre) and Anna Steiner (Solicitor and Senior Lecturer, Westminster University). There was an excellent turnout and attendees heard thought-provoking presentations. We are grateful to everyone who took the time to ask questions based on the experiences of those directly affected by the scandal. A recording of the webinar can be accessed here.
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AJC Full Council Meeting, 22 July 2020
On 22nd July, the Administrative Justice Council held its fifth full Council meeting. The focus of the meeting was the impact of COVID-19 on the administrative justice system. Attendees from the tribunal, ombudsman, advice and pro bono sectors shared their experiences on how they had been affected by the pandemic and the measures that had been put in place to help run services as effectively as possible.
Also discussed was the impact on users, including issues around access to justice and the change in profile of those seeking advice during the pandemic. The Council also heard about two new projects: the joint AJC/JUSTICE Benefits Reform Working Party; and a new advice sector panel project, with Access Social Care, on social care. Minutes and papers for the meeting have been published on the AJC website here. |
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IRAL response
Professor Robert Thomas, Co-Chair of the AJC Academic Panel, took the lead in responding to the recent Independent Review of Administrative Law. Chaired by Lord Faulks QC, the aim of the review was to consider options for reform to the process of Judicial Review. You can read the AJC response here.
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Advice Sector Panel respond to the Justice Committee’s Future of Legal Aid Inquiry
The Advice Sector Panel responded to the recent call for evidence from the Justice Committee Inquiry. The Inquiry was set up to identify the major challenges facing legal aid both now and in the future, and in particular to gain evidence on the impact of COVID-19 on legal aid, the sustainability of the legal aid market and what effect the digitisation of legal advice and court services was having on users. The Panel’s response shone a light on the negative effects LASPO has had on access to justice, legal aid contract numbers and the availability of specialist legal aid lawyers, whilst considering how the increased need for assistance as the digitisation programme is rolled out, especially from more vulnerable users, has left the remaining advice organisations struggling to cope. You can read the Panel’s response here.
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- MEMBER NEWS AND UPDATES -
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Advice NI produce briefing paper on digital appeals in response to suspension of oral hearings
In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, Northern Ireland’s president of Tribunals and The Appeals Service (TAS) has suspended all in-person oral tribunal hearings until further notice.
Challenges associated with the rapid introduction of remote digital appeals include the consideration that as Northern Ireland hosts the UK’s largest digital divide, many who rely on benefits are unable to access the appeals process. 15% of the population have no internet access and 32.2% have low or no digital skills. Furthermore, economically inactive individuals are over four times more likely to be offline than the general population.
Advice NI has produced a Briefing Paper which explores the possible advantages and disadvantages of digital appeal hearings. Advice NI is also developing a training course for advisers entitled 'Social Security Tribunal Representation during Covid-19' which will focus on how to orientate tribunal representatives in the process for non face-to-face hearings, and will include a demonstration of the new platform being used by The Appeals Service.
(Kevin Higgins, AJC Advice Sector Panel member, Head of Policy, Advice NI)
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HMCTS Accepts Report Recommendations
HMCTS has formally accepted the recommendations set out in Dr Natalie Byrom’s 2019 report entitled ‘Digital Justice: HMCTS data strategy and delivering access to justice’. Dr Byrom, Council member and Director of Research and Learning at The Legal Education Foundation, is calling on HMCTS to move faster to ensure that the opportunity to deliver justice for all through the reform programme is not missed. The Legal Education Foundation’s response can be read in full here.
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Providing welfare benefit advice during the pandemic
In 2019, the AJC surveyed the advice sector on their capacity to deliver Digital Support services as part of the court and tribunal modernisation programme. The subsequent report on ‘Digitisation and Accessing Justice in the Community’ (April 2020) found, amongst other things, that ‘many of the respondent organisations have service users who are vulnerable and the most needy in society. A large number of people approaching for help with a legal problem would need support and legal advice, together with ongoing digital assistance to navigate on online justice system.’
We have now commissioned a new and related survey, to understand how advice providers have been working during the pandemic, and how the migration to remote advice delivery has changed their services and impacted their clients. Responses to this survey will be incorporated into a report by the AJC on the impact of Covid-19 on the advice sector, which we will use to demonstrate to Government and specifically the Ministry of Justice the importance of investment in the technical capability of the sector to provide remotely delivered advice and to ensure access to justice. It will also assist the joint JUSTICE/AJC Working Party, Reforming Benefits Decision-Making, which is looking specifically at the challenges faced by clients and social welfare advice providers during the pandemic.
The survey closed on 29th October 2020 and we received 133 responses. The data will be analysed and a report issued over the next few months. We would like to thank Diane Sechi (Pro Bono and Advice Sector Panel Member, Simmons & Simmons) and Dr Naomi Creutzfeldt (Co-Chair of our Academic Panel, Westminster University) for their work in leading these two projects. The report will be shared in a future edition of our Newsletter.
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NHS Continuing Healthcare:
Getting it right first time
The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO) has published a report into complaints we have seen about NHS Continuing Healthcare (CHC). The report sets out the two main themes identified in complaints about CHC in recent years and makes some practical recommendations to support the system to improve.
Firstly, the report describes failings in care and support planning for people with care needs. This leads to people who are eligible for CHC not being provided with plans that sufficiently address their care needs. In some cases, people’s families provided the care themselves or paid for care on top of that which had been provided by the NHS.
Secondly, failings were found in reviews of previously unassessed periods of care. Where people’s care needs change over time, Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) can assess their eligibility for CHC for previous periods of care. Failings were found in CCGs’ handling of retrospective assessments of people’s eligibility for care resulted in people going for long periods of time with uncertainty about their finances.
The review of over 300 decisions made on complaints over the past three years shows that people continue to be seriously let down by failings in the way CHC is handled by CCGs. The impact of these mistakes can be devastating, as the cases included in the report show. Find out more about the findings and recommendations that will help the NHS to deliver consistent, high quality care that meets individuals’ needs. Read the report: NHS Continuing Healthcare: Getting it right first time |
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Research: The Scottish Parliament's Casework
Dr Chris Gill (AJC Academic Panel, University of Glasgow) has published a report on The Scottish Parliament’s Casework: Understanding the Hidden Work of MSPs. The report summarises the findings of a research project investigating how MSPs and their caseworkers deal with cases brought to them by constituents. The research involved interviewing MSPs and their caseworkers to collect both quantitative and qualitative information about their casework.
A sample of 10% of MSP offices (13 out of 129) took part in the research. The report concludes that the casework service delivered by MSPs amounts to a substantial, publicly-funded advice service for citizens. If the volume of cases in the research sample was replicated across all Members, MSPs could be expected to deal with 106,613 cases annually and to employ over 180 caseworkers.
The report identifies the value of this hidden work, but also suggests that we need to know more about potential variations in how it is delivered. There are also opportunities for casework to be used systematically to inform public policy development and scrutiny. The research was conducted as part of a Scottish Parliament Academic Fellowship.
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