Legal Aid: BVT comment

10 December 2007

Commenting on the Legal Services Commission's consultation on Best Value Tendering for Criminal Legal Aid Services, launched today, Andrew Holroyd Law Society President, said:

"A large number of questions about how BVT could operate in the real legal aid world remain unanswered in this consultation.  If the LSC cannot answer these questions but press on with BVT, the Society is concerned that the firms they need to provide the service will be driven out of legal aid and it will be impossible to rebuild the supplier base.  The LSC must now tell us for example how firms can tender when volume cannot be guaranteed, how solicitors can tender for multiple contracts to businesses that will be competing against each other, how the LSC will ensure that BME firms are treated equally and in a non-discriminatory manner and fundamentally, how firms can offer a rational bid when the Government keeps changing the criminal justice system?"