The government must listen to the Dowler family and stop its civil justice reforms

23 September 2011

The Dowler family have asked the Prime Minister David Cameron and his deputy Nick Clegg to stop the unjust and unfair legislation that will significantly weaken the 'no win no fee' mechanisms they used to fight their case against News International. These changes threaten to remove access to justice for millions of middle-income families and individuals.

Writing an open letter to the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister the Dowlers have called for the current way of funding cases by 'no win, no fee' agreements to remain - and not be effectively dismantled as envisaged by Coalition government plans. They say, “We were lucky that we fell under [the current] system. We understand that the new law affects thousands of people who want to sue News of the World and other news papers.”

The reforms, currently being pushed through Parliament by Conservative Justice Minister Jonathan Djanogly, are set to make 'no win, no fee' conditional fee arrangements much more difficult for ordinary people to use. This will remove access to justice for millions of middle income; middle England families who are victims of accidents, fraud, negligence, injustice and other wrongdoing.

The Law Society has warned the government that the proposed changes to the 'no win, no fee' rules seriously undermine access to justice for families like the Dowlers and other victims of wrongdoing.

Des Hudson, Chief Executive of the Law Society said:

“After all they have been through we welcome - and are humbled by - the intervention of theDowler family in this debate. They have succeeded in making it clear to thePrime Minister that it is ordinary families with terrible life challenges that will be impacted the most. They will be the losers. As a society we need toprotect them and their access to justice.

The only winners from the government's proposed changes in the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill will be insurance companies and large corporations, that will now have to pay out hundreds of millions of pounds less when they commit negligence or other wrongs, such as illegal phone tapping. The losers will be victims of wrongdoing, who will in future be simply too intimidated by the financial risks to seeking redress.

Coupled with the proposed £350 million cut to legal aid funding, these changes to 'no win, no fee' agreements form a devastating dual assault on access to justice. In the criminal justice field the Government is quite rightly trying to place the victim at the heart of the system. Why then -in the civil justice field - is it willing to risk removing victims from the heart of the civil justice system and replacing them with the interests of the insurance lobby and large multi-national corporations like News International? The government must re-examine these plans as a matter of urgent priority.'

The Dowlers close their letter by warning the Prime Minister:

“We are sure you do not want to go down as the Prime Minister who took the rights away from ordinary people so that large companies could print whatever they like and break the law”.

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