Looking for something to keep you interested whilst by the pool sipping a St Miguel next week? Here is the LSC Annual Report and Corporate Plan.

It's cheeper than the latest Jilly Cooper too!

On the last day in July the site stats. suggest that this has been the busiest month to date, certainly with regard to "visits". There has been pretty steady growth this year and now we have 350-400 regular visitors who check out the site once or twice a week.

The feedback we get is universally supportive (surprisingly including some voices from the other side) so frankly some constructive criticism would be nice. Certainly the incorporation of the precedent materials to the side bar was a major step forward in recent times so what else would improve the site?

For my part I have been a bit surprised by how little commenting goes on. To reiterate this can be done anonymously (just give a fake e-mail address when you post) or under a pseudonym. Am I not being controversial enough or are you all too busy?

Could we do with more guest posts? I would be happy to incorporate articles from the "readership", especially contrary viewpoints - so there's an invite there too.

Beyond that it seems to be steady as she goes at the moment unless, of course, you have any other ideas!

Over the years we have moved from pencil, hand-written booklets through various forms of electronically produced reports to the current version of CCA documentation. As I start on my third or fourth appeal based on the latest paper work I cannot understand how they have arrived at this format unless they have spent weeks in committee constructing the most difficult and infuriating scheme possible. Have they done this just to p**s me off or am I just getting either above myself or paranoid?

For crying out loud there is not even a single sheet summarising the cases reviewed and the costs involved anymore!!!

Sandra is having an equally frustrating experience with Parcelfarce.

We are having a Friday afternoon swearathon.

UPDATE

The managing agents of our office block have just changed and the new ones (who charge us considerably more) no longer supply a trolly for moving storage boxes of files. Is this the third and final oath inducing incident of the afternoon?

And YES I blame the LSC for all this!!!

My initial take on the LSC contribution to Carters civil proposals was that they had steamed in too early in hobnailed boots. Our commentators thought so too as, seemingly, did the LAPG (though they are more polite than me!).

Richard gets a bigger platform for his views here and the remainder of those quoted seem to be in line too. In particular Christina Blacklaws echoes our interpretation of Carter's grasp of "the dawning reality, of a fragile (CLS) market" which seems to have passed the LSC by.

Last week I spoke to a multi contract civil supplier who would experience an overall 30% reduction on the basis of the LSC's standard fee proposals. No amount of "efficiency savings" are going to remedy that. A radical change in contract delivery might however, either that or fish and chip shops and plumbing as an alternative career.

News reaches us of a client firm being alerted, over the phone by an account manager, of an incoming bombshell. This, they were warned, would come in the form of a wrongly sent notification of a Category 4, "below competence" PR result. One imagines they have also dispatched the duty first aider in case this correspondence gets into the hands of an older partner with a dodgy ticker!

BTW our "Facing up to Peer Review" support and development package is being launched in the next few days. If you want an early copy of the brochure (which is electronically too big to link to here) just get in touch.

Our original CDS 6 Wizard was a result of strong prophetic powers and a moment of inspiration. Having spent yesterday analysing data to assist a firm frame its thinking about Carter, our hunch that maintaining a record of all contract billing data would be vital has proved spot on. (I am most smug and self satisfied that we had this vision as long ago as 1999, (although it realisation took a little longer).

Today we launch an "on-line" version for firms wishing to bill in this more secure manner and in advance of it becoming mandatory. This version has nothing to do with any of the above, rather it is down to a young man with a very big brain called Adam Mallinson who works for Bassra Solicitors in Bradford.

It works pretty much as before, with a couple of extra buttons, but requires personalisation e.g. passwords and LA account numbers. This time round we would like to monitor how many firms are using it and also to avoid mistakes we will customise it for you. Consequently we want to release it on a request only basis, rather than have it available on download here. So if you want one, and it is still free give us a ring or an e-mail. We will require your full LA account number.

Finally, on behalf of all users, can I thank Adam and Ray, his boss, for taking this product to this new level of sophistication. Thanks.

Its too hot, and Andy is away so I'm handling more phone queries than before, and I'm busy, and I'm in a hurry to get to my next appointment. So I am resorting to the last refuge of a blogging scoundrel and simply re-posting other peoples stuff. (That said they did send it to me as a press release and they clearly like us to pass things on so its not that bad really is it?)

Will do two posts tomorrow by way of penance.

LAPG WELCOMES JOINT COMMITTEE REPORT ON LEGAL SERVICES BILL

The Legal Aid Practitioners Group today welcomed the report from the
Joint Committee on the Draft Legal Services Bill.

He continued, "It is now vital that the Government listens to the
concerns of these respected members of both Houses, and reconsiders the
provisions to be included in the Bill when it is introduced."

Last week I commented on the first two criminal firms to check past performance with Carter proposed standard fees. Both felt reasonably reassured.

The next two - one civil and one crime - report an entirely different outcome and a distinct lack of reassurance. Tomorrow I am spending the afternoon with another CDS and CLS supplier asking the same question. Fortunately they have acres of data contained in the CDS 6 & CMRF Wizards. Can I say this again these are vital especially now and they are free.

More exciting news on these items later in the week. . Stay tuned.

It also looks like I am going to be Roger Mellie.

My old colleague and mate from my LAB days, Peter Beckford, is leaving the Commission and the UK and is heading for the land of Oz. Those who know him will know he was one of the good guys who treated firms straight and ran the CDS in Yorkshire fairly and well. He will be a loss to the LSC.

All the best cobber.

Having not done a Cost Committee for a while two have come along back to back.

Friday we were arguing about out of time billing in Leeds and today I have a batch of reduced CDS 7s in Manchester. I need to get in the car and drive there in a minute.

After than I am down to Brum and the chance to become a TV presenter tomorrow. More on Wednesday

Our training response to Carter will once again be a joint one, with TMT training, and friend of this site Rodney Warren. It will involve a full-day dealing with the detail of the proposals and with practical advice on survival techniques. Details of the course are here and if you wish to come you can download a booking form. (Be patient with the downloads).

We hope it will live up to its title and prove the most comprehensive package of information and advice available regarding this central challenge.

I have spoken with two firms who have had a look at this, recalculated their recent claiming profile and arrived at some interesting conclusions.

If you have the time and the IT functionality give it a go. If not download our CDS 6 and CMRF Wizards then have a try.

The LAPG now add their comments on the LSC's civil proposals:

Re national/regional fixed fees: "The proposed fixed fees are complete
nonsense. The LSC has put forward two options, a national or a regional
fixed fee. A housing practitioner in London may get £163 or £206 per case. A
community care lawyer in Wales may get £292 or £420. An education lawyer in
the East of England may get £293 or £196. There is clearly no underlying
rationale behind the figures being offered - no relation to work done on
these cases, no relation to demand, no relation to the need to encourage
supply, no relation to local or national priorities."

"We are concerned that this appears on the face of it to be another attempt
to introduce the limits that were eventually dropped as unreasonable two
years ago. The figures proposed seem to bear no relationship to the time
needed to deliver even barely competent work according to peer review
standards, yet firms will be expected to deliver at least 'competence plus'.
Inclusion of interpreters' fees within the graduated fees is completely
unacceptable, and will probably have a  racially discriminatory effect.
Practitioners will be mortified at yet another attack on their ability to
deliver a good service to their clients. It is difficult to believe that
these proposals could have been produced in good faith by someone who wants
a quality immigration legal aid service in this country.

I had a long discussion concerning the post Carter world with a client firm yesterday afternoon and am going out to do the same face-to-face this morning (makes a change from Immigration CCAs).

Both pose me essentially the same question "is there a future?". What is disturbing is that both represent, in their respective markets, just the type of firm, i.e. a probable Preferred Supplier, the LSC both want, and will need, to keep in the scheme. Despite that both are seriously considering a new life outside of publicly funded work which, with todays practice, will create the LSC with a massive local supply problem.

And my advice?

As it has always been, despite the potential loss of work to my firm, if you can move to private client only work do it.

I tend to agree with Nigel in the comments on Fridays last post. Certainly Lord Carter's approach to the civil scheme, demonstrating sensitivity given the fragility of the market, seems to have passed the LSC by. One might describe it as "more robust" or point to inconsistency with the tone of the headline report. It does however seem to demonstrate intent.

Perhaps this is why they are looking for Braveheart.

I cannot provide a direct download link to this this consultation document because it is "too large"! (It is the top item on the right hand side download list).

I thought my post below was pretty nifty work but to get this out the next day is brilliant. Hats off to those at the LSC who have clearly worked throughout last night. You ain't going to get me doing that tonight.

Hat Tip

Nigel Ford (as ever)

Update

A very quick breeze through the executive summary gives you the following key points:

New contracts April next year (unified with the NfP scheme). Minimum fund take volumes of 25 or 50K will be required and there will not be a general bid round but you are not guaranteed a contract. Cat. 3 CCA and those with bad audit results can be excluded. Licence only contracts are to go and key SQM points will be made into contract requirements. Quality requirements will be a PR score of 2 or above. Annual 100% reconciliation of contract will be introduced. Finally a move to fixed and graduated fees will take place.

More on Monday no doubt have a good weekend - I won't I'll be reading and re-reading all this stuff - hopefully outside in the sun with the lovely Stella to hand.

Usually at times like this people ring me, knowing I will at least read a document they have not had time to. What they seek is a quick and pithy summary with a few opinionated comments thrown in. Nowadays this place has become a better medium for such communication so here goes.

Lets begin with yesterdays initial response, the key practical development in these proposals are that they are more gradualist and so all firms get something of a breathing space. That said 2009 looms large especially for Criminal practices.

For those who have attended our recent courses on Preferred Supplier (PSS) the proposals are pretty much as we predicted with one major difference - there will, ultimately, be an element of competition (more later). The next three years will therefore be something of a war of attrition with the PSS and the imposition of fixed fees being used quite nakedly to prune firms out of the scheme and create the market conditions for "fewer, larger firms" to develop. Peer Review, again quite explicitly, will be the immediate agent in this process (although the final threshold required is not satisfactorily explained).

The speed of change is faster and more aggressive in the CDS than the CLS. There is a strong feeling of kid gloves being on with the latter. The dawning reality, of a fragile market , has tempered proposals not least because many of the target PSs might just jack it in and do private work instead. This would effectively leave a rump of less good suppliers and the not-for-profit sector to deliver the scheme which is a real and frightening concern. Consequently all family and civil proposals are significantly more tentative with a 2010 or later deadline for the implementation of the competitive element of the scheme. There is also a strong commitment to the Community Legal Advice Centre and Network proposals.

Back to the CDS where the pace of change is swifter, and the focus of proposals more sharply defined. For instance there are suggested, all-inclusive standard fees in the appendices and a worked our example (from my part of the world) of how PACE schemes will be rationalised. Both of these will take place next year along with changes to the Duty Solicitor requirements.

The issue of minimum value contracts etc. is raised in relation to both CDS and CLS suppliers but looks, initially, to be set fairly low (50K in CDS - and that is total fund take). How this will develop is less clear and will probably only come out when the details of the "best value competition" scheme are finalised.

Here the final picture is not entirely clear and a very significant role has been given to the LSC to go away and plan this, which must be a major concern. The three key features will remain quality, volume and cost and the original capacity only auctions have disappeared from the horizon. There will however be a price based bidding process somewhere down the line. In this there is a powerful indication of very wide regional flexibility becoming a central feature of the final scheme. One can take differing views on this - it is clearly essential - however it seem to this writer not sufficiently nailed down at this point to allay fears about transparency. Even though this will end in competition and minimum bids etc. there does however seem to be a "sub contractor" escape hatch for good quality smaller firms.

Obviously the above is only a brief, initial summary - those with more detailed interpretative concerns should use the comments box or give me a ring.

And the opinionated bit?

This seems to me a warmed over mish mash of previously tried or considered approaches. Best Value returns after the BIDCOM (disaster) experiment, there is the reintroduction of "intelligent contract" thinking and Frontier Economics input/output obsessions are reinforced. Fundamentally there is the paradox of the title and the reality. These are sold as "market" reforms however they involve, nay require, significant manipulation of the market in order to arrive at their goal. The fact that the market has not developed in the way Carter thinks it should, and the quoted research might lead one to expect, is not addressed. That fewer, larger firms have not developed to any great extent is due to many factors, not least the underlying rates. Also there is the fact that these are people based businesses. We have visited many hundreds of firms over the last 10 years (and many more in our various previous jobs) and seen practices of a variety of shapes and sizes. Predominantly these are small to medium enterprises whose success, or otherwise, is determined by how good the key players are, or to put it into the language of today, how good the Leadership is. No amount of market tinkering, based on a wish to move to a research grounded notion of a more cost effective, model practice, will change this. I could say more but that will have to do for now.

Finally apologies for this being a rough post I have too little time to go back and polish it.

You opinions will be gratefully received.

Most noticeably the proposals seem more evolutionary in comparison to the interim report. That said there is clearly a timetable for fundamental restructuring leading to "best value" contracting beginning in 2009. In terms of imminence, our near obsession with Peer Review has proven prescient with a dynamic, profession wide, 2-3 year "managed roll out" of the scheme starting now. (Training on this in Hull next Wednesday and we will be offering a 9 month development service from next week).

Next up will be a range of standard and graduated fees across civil and criminal work. "Competition" will then follow first in Crime (2009) and then in Civil (2010) which will be on a "best value" basis.

I will fill this out either later today or tomorrow so I you could resist the urge to call until then I would be very grateful.

Most practitioners however should breath a small sigh of relief.

Update

LAPG's initial response is below - Click on the blue "continue reading" link.

Further Update

The CLSA's initial take, and a booking form for two briefing meetings next week, can be found here.

LAPG FEARS CARTER PROPOSALS WILL REDUCE QUALITY OF SERVICE TO CLIENTS

The Legal Aid Practitioners Group today expressed concern that Lord Carter's
proposals for reform of criminal legal aid will lead to a reduction in the
quality of service available to clients.

Director Richard Miller said, "Lord Carter has probably done as well as
anyone could have done with this brief, and has clearly listened and
responded to concerns expressed about his interim report. The analysis that
has been undertaken is also very informative. Nonetheless the result is
disappointing, and depends on mechanisms that are untested and carry a
significant risk of not working.

"Lord Carter has spelt out that delivering criminal legal aid within a fixed
budget cannot work if increasing demands are placed on the budget by changes
in the wider criminal justice system (see note 3 below). But we do not think
it is either possible or desirable to constrain the system in such a way. We
hope the police will continue to bring more offenders to justice. We hope
they will continue to use more sophisticated techniques to detect crime. And
we know the Government has announced a major review of the working of the
criminal justice system. Fixed fees might work in a 'steady state'
environment. The criminal justice system is not, and should not be, in a
steady state. We believe that Lord Carter's premise underpinning his
proposals for the criminal legal aid system is dependent on a precondition
that cannot be met. The probable outcome of using fixed fees within a wider
system that is not fixed is a serious reduction in the quality of service to
clients."

The Group pointed to independent research carried out for Lord Carter, which
demonstrated the economic problems at the heart of the criminal legal aid
system. Miller said, "The Otterburn Consulting research demonstrated that
even in the best-run firms, it is difficult to make a viable business of
criminal defence work. The contrast between the £50 per hour paid for this
service and the £300 per hour or more paid out of taxpayers' money to
lawyers working for other public bodies is stark. The increase in the
overall legal aid budget hides the fact that rates have not been increased
in cash terms, let alone in real terms, for over a decade. For routine
cases, the payments are now less than the cost of providing the service,
which frequently has to be cross-subsidised from other work. Lord Carter's
proposals do nothing to address these problems."

He continued, "We are disappointed that there has been no research into why
there are so many small firms when the theoretical economic modelling
indicates that this business structure is not viable at current rates. What
are the other forces at work that have stopped firms from organising
themselves in what the economists claim is a more economically rational way?
Criminal defence services are personal services that must be delivered
locally, which prevents firms outside the largest urban areas from
structuring themselves in the way the economists recommend. This doesn't
seem to have been understood, which makes it unlikely that these proposals
will enable a viable criminal defence profession to emerge."

Comments on specific issues

Impact on black and minority ethnic firms

Lord Carter highlights how the changes he proposes are likely to have the
effect of removing from the system many of the smallest firms, and
acknowledges that black and minority ethnic firms in London are likely to be
particularly under threat. It is vital that quality is not compromised, but
subject to that proviso, there is an onus on the Government to ensure that
the solicitors who are allowed to provide these services reflect the ethnic
diversity of the client groups they serve.

Quality assurance

LAPG believes that a fixed price system will inevitably lead to a driving
down of standards. We are concerned that if responsibility is transferred to
the Law Society, the Society will oversee the first impact of these changes
in reducing quality, and may be wrongly blamed for it. We welcome in
principle the proposal for a quality assurance scheme for advocacy, but do
not believe it is practical to develop the scheme for criminal advocates by
April 2007, and have concerns about the likely cost.

Police station

LAPG believes that the complex new system proposed in order to issue block
contracts for police station work will deliver no significant benefits over
the existing system. It is inappropriate to use fixed fees for work that can
amount to anything from thirty minutes' work in an afternoon to several
hours' work in the middle of the night to many hours' work spread over
several weeks. Would Lord Levy be happy with a solicitor who was being paid
just a fixed fee based on an average case? It is wrong to abolish higher
payments for work in unsocial hours. The fees could be rendered inadequate
by changes in the law, developments in the gathering of evidence, or in
policing priorities. For example, the new CPS charging initiative means that
many police station cases now need two separate attendances instead of just
one. It is unreasonable to expect the lawyer to bear the cost of this. It is
inappropriate to use fixed fees when a series of terrorist raids, or a
single case such as the Soham or Sion Jenkins cases, can disproportionately
impact on the cost to the lawyer of delivering their service.

Magistrates Court

LAPG sees no benefit to the taxpayer, the LSC, to clients or to firms in
changing the current system of standard fees in the Magistrates Court. The
current system has controlled costs to the satisfaction of the LSC and is
understood by firms. We are glad that Lord Carter has moved away from
recommending an immediate move to a different system of fixed fees. We
accept the rolling up of travelling costs, but would urge that the fee is
recalculated where Courts are closed, requiring solicitors to travel
further. However, waiting time is driven by the inefficiencies of Courts,
prosecutors and police and is not within the control of firms. Therefore
removing payments for waiting only serves to penalise firms for the
inefficiency of others under the control of the Home Office.

Crown Court

LAPG believes that there is merit in exploring a graduated fee scheme for
Crown Court work. However, there is a major difference between a scheme
covering a few hours work over a few days, and one covering many weeks of
work over a few months. The scope for variation in the litigation aspect, as
opposed to the advocacy element, is huge. We will need to consider the
proposals very carefully to see whether the proposed triggers for uplifts
are adequate to make the system fair and workable. The idea that the scheme
could be ready to be introduced by April 2007 appears unrealistic.

Very High Cost Criminal Cases

The proposals for very high cost cases depend on a degree of forecasting of
demand and supply that is in our view impossible. Demand for these services
depends on decisions made by the Serious Fraud Office (and in future the
Serious and Organised Crime Agency). This is not something over which the
LSC has the remotest degree of control. Other aspects of the proposal merit
further consideration.

Civil and family work

Lord Carter's proposals for civil and family work show a welcome recognition
that there are limits to the circumstances in which fixed fees are workable.
While we may well have concerns about the detail of these proposals, they do
not give rise to the same objections on principle that the criminal
provisions do.

Are we there yet?

09.30

Are we there yet?

10.30

Here we are.

Off to read it -will post later!

The links take a moment so be patient.

With two appeals put to bed yesterday, one on Peer Review and one on SQM CQCs, I am left with the most impenetrable Immigration CCA audit I have ever witnessed - and that is saying something. On top of this 8 storage boxes arrived, with the next one in the queue, this morning! I thought this was over!

Consequently my head hurts. (And we are comfort eating burgers for lunch)

With tomorrow potentially being Carter Day I need to keep things brief today. There are however two debates you might wish join in. The first, directly below this post, regarding Cost Committees (especially following NF's very frank comment yesterday) and this one. The latter will be of interest to CDS participants.

Happy Carter Day tomorrow!

I promised some more thoughts on this.

In fairness I can say little about the Funding Review element of the proposals (appeals against merits refusals of funding applications) however I have some (considerable) experience of Cost Committees. In fact I have made proposals to solve the problem in the past.

I do not have time for a lengthy post today (see yesterday for reasons) so lets cut to the chase.

The paper identifies a high success rate at FRC, or an appalling failure rate depending upon your point of view. Our experience of CCA has been discussed elsewhere with something over 80% of initial gradings proving wrong following appeal - either resolved before or after a CC hearing. In an executive summary making five key proposals the first two seem to me to be the most important. These suggest the need for better LSC decision making and then "more robust and consistent internal review". With this implemented arguably the remaining three might become unnecessary.

I will go further and take you back to this quote from the October link above:

"I wonder if someone directed - "allow no uplifts and leave it to Costs Committees to decide" and LSC caseworkers are just following orders?. I think we should be told.

The CCA experience of recent years was of a cost inspired feeding frenzy, largely to recover the LSC's position in Immigration created by its own policy failures when responding to dispersal via "expansion contracts" (link to Focus article not possible). The same cash imperative and a wish to discipline the profession, under pressure from the audit commission?, lead to its implementation across all categories. We are currently witnessing this process repeat itself in Mental Health.

I think more general orders, of the type alleged above, went out 2 to 3 years ago and have recently been repeated regarding MHRT work. This is both contrary to the letter and spirit of the first two thoroughly sensible proposals. If I am wrong then lets have those LSC readers of this blog (yes we know you're out there!) put the record straight.

In brief I would support the move to a combined committee but would strongly resist the loss of a general right of audience and the move to a single adjudicator, though specialist training remains an ongoing necessity. Finally I can find absolutely no objection to better links with the "relationship management process".

That said we should be under no illusions, these are knee jerk responses created to resolve the effects of knee jerk responses and past LSC policy/practice and my single proposal of placing the Commission at cost risk at CC/FRC would sort this out over night.

Our phones, if not quite on fire, have been at least warmed through with the latest round of Tailored Fixed Fee (TFF) amendments. Those today involve reductions in the ongoing fee because annual average reporting has dropped by over 20%.

If its happened to you and you want to talk about possible angles of defence give us a ring.

Steve is with me today and we are working on two of the four appeals currently occupying minds here in Middlesbrough,

I have, yet again, an immigration CCA containing the usual heady mix of lack of evidence of means and arguments about the time taken to prepared trial bundles. There is a further sample of asylum files, with a similarly high audit rating, in transit.

Steve has an SQM audit failure including much to be avoided Critical Quality Concerns which we are challenging. Audits of this sort are rare nowadays (as training audiences confirm) and likely to become more so under PSS. Nonetheless having such findings on your record at this time is not a good idea so yet again we are at loggerheads with the LSC over what looks like fairly sloppy auditing. (Perhaps it is just rusty auditing due to lack of practice).

So its head in files again for pretty much all this week except Thursday when we anticipate a Carter related day.

Sorry but I can't avoid bringing you this quote from Lord Falconer in the Telegraph.

When Lord Falconer says "consult", he presumably means "impose".

"That, I'm afraid, is the right word," he replies. By law, there would have to be consultation. But Lord Falconer's ultimatum to the lawyers this weekend is a stark one: do a deal with Lord Carter or have one imposed on you.

For those of a strong disposition the full article is here.

Didn't want to sell it anyhow!!

It appears that the MHLA inspired Judicial Review against the new specialist unit, contract compliance audits has at least stayed the first round of appeal hearings. Lets hope for a result at full time as well.

Less good news comes from the second PR appellant to go through the process with a confirmed cat 4 outcome. This confirms my deepening pessimism regarding this process as does the findings on the appeal I am currently, and with a heavy heart, preparing.

Has anyone got anything cheery to say in the comments box?

I return to my desk after two day away to the usual mountain of paper. This includes two CCA appeals, ongoing PR representations (I have stopped calling these appeals) and a CC hearing regarding out of time billing. On top of this are two references (why people think anyone listens to my opinion is unclear) and the negative outcome of an SQM audit. Best get moving then.

If you look closely on the LSC site you can find this. It is a set of proposals for the reform of the costs and applications appeals procedures. I haven't time to say much on it today but perhaps later in the week. You have until the last Friday in July to respond. Once again I am indebted to Mr Ford for finding this in the first place.

Many thanks to those who sent birthday wishes on Friday. The England result aside we had a nice celebration on Saturday and I may put some pictures up later in the week.