Legal Aid for Inquests Timeline Updated: August 2021 Every independent review and public inquiry that has considered issues faced by bereaved families over the past 20 years has recommended that the inequality of arms between bereaved families and the state at inquests should be addressed. Yet the Ministry of Justice have disregarded the overwhelming evidence and ignored the voices of bereaved families. For more information see the campaign page. Official support 1999-2021 2022 Victims' Commissioner Response to Ministry of Justice's Victims' Law consultation We are therefore calling for automatic, non-means tested public funding to be made available to bereaved families for legal help and at inquests at which a public authority, or private body fulfilling public functions, is to be legal represented. 2021 Westminster Commission on Legal Aid Inquiry into the Sustainability and Recovery of the Legal Aid Sector Expand access to legal aid for bereaved families for inquests. 2021 Victims' Commissioner The Victims' Commissioner calls for legal aid for inquests in letter to Lord Chancellor I am writing to you to set out the case for your Department to undertake a review of the funding of legal representation at inquests in all cases where someone has died whilst in the custody or care of public authorities, or where a public authority is involved in the circumstances of the death. 2021 Justice Select Committee The Coroner Service Bereaved people should not be put through the difficult and time-consuming process of meeting the exceptional cases requirements and the means test for legal aid where public authorities are legally represented at public expense at the inquest into the death of their loved one. The Ministry of Justice should by 1 October 2021, for all inquests where public authorities are legally represented, make sure that non-means tested legal aid or other public funding for legal representation is also available for the people that have been bereaved. 2021 The Bar Council Running on Empty: Civil Legal Aid Research Report There is a serious problem with inequality of arms when it comes to bereaved families being represented at inquests. 2020 JUSTICE working party 'When Things Go Wrong: The response of the justice system' The current arrangements mean that legal representation at inquests is out of reach for the vast majority of bereaved people… state and corporate interested persons are typically able to deploy ranks of solicitors, junior barristers and QCs to advise and advocate on these issues. In this context, to claim that families’ effective participation can be guaranteed by the coroner and the “inquisitorial” nature of the process is to ignore the reality. 2020 Independent Advisory Panel on Deaths in Custody Submission to the Justice Select Committee inquiry on the Coroner Service The IAP supports the call, made in the Harris Review and a range of other independent reviews such as Dame Elish Angiolini’s report into deaths and serious incidents in policecustody, for the introduction of non-means tested legal aid for bereaved families where someone has died in the care of the state.8 This would ensure meaningful participationand ‘parity of arms’. 2019 Joint Committee on Human Rights The detention of young people with learning disabilities and/or autism Families must be given non-means tested funding for legal representation at inquests where the state has separate representation for one or more interested persons. 2019 Ministry of Justice, Final Report: Review of legal aid for inquests We have decided that we will not be introducing non means tested legal aid for inquests where the state has representation. 2019 Final report of the Independent Review of the Mental Health Act Modernising the Mental Health Act: Increasing choice, reducing compulsion chaired by Sir Simon Wessely. Funding should be available for the families of those who have died unnaturally, violently or by suicide whilst detained, to receive non means tested legal aid. This would be to help families to understand the processes, their rights, and what steps they can take. This would include funding to attend the inquest, but should also be available to support families immediately after the death of the patient. 2018 Independent Office for Police Conduct Consultation response: to MoJ’s call for evidence regarding legal representation for families at Inquests. We believe legal aid should be automatically available to bereaved families following deaths in custody or other state detention. This is particularly critical at inquests, as legal proceedings are often complex and other parties, including the police, will ordinarily be represented. 2018 Ministry of Justice: Review of legal aid for inquests Call for evidence, July 2018. Recent reports have highlighted the need to examine the provision of legal aid for death in custody cases and deaths where the state may have been involved. A better understanding of cases where the state has legal representation is needed to inform discussions about equality of arms for bereaved people more generally. 2018 Joint Committee on Human Rights Enforcing human rights. Tenth Report of Session 2017-2019. While inquests are theoretically inquisitorial, in practice they often have a more adversarial nature. If inquests are to remain inquisitorial, families must be given non-means tested funding for legal representation at inquests where the state has separate representation for one or more interested persons. 2017 HHJ Mark Lucraft QC, Chief Coroner Report of the Chief Coroner to the Lord Chancellor. Fourth Annual Report: 2016-2017. The Chief Coroner therefore recommends that the Lord Chancellor gives consideration to amending the Exceptional Funding Guidance (Inquests) so as to provide exceptional funding for legal representation for the family where the state has agreed to provide separate representation for one or more interested persons. 2017 Hillsborough Review The patronising disposition of unaccountable power: A report to ensure the pain and suffering of the Hillsborough families is not repeated by The Right Reverend Bishop James Jones. Publicly funded legal representation should be made available to bereaved families at inquests at which a public authority is to be legally represented. This could be achieved through amendments to the Ministry of Justice’s Lord Chancellor’s Exceptional Funding Guidance (Inquests) and should not need primary legislation. The requirement for a means test and financial contribution from the family should also be waived in these cases. Where necessary, funding for pathology or other expert evidence should also be made available. 2017 Bach Commission The Right to Justice: The final report of the Bach Commission. Where the state is funding one or more of the other parties at an inquest, it should also provide legal aid for representation of the family of the deceased. 2017 Angiolini Review Report of the Independent Review of Deaths and Serious Incidents in Police Custody by Rt. Hon. Dame Elish Angiolini DBE QC. For the state to fulfil its legal obligations of allowing effective participation of families in the process that is meaningful and not “empty and rhetorical” there should be access for the immediate family to free, non-means tested legal advice, assistance and representation immediately following the death and throughout the Inquest hearing. 2016 HHJ Peter Thornton QC, Chief Coroner Report of the Chief Coroner to the Lord Chancellor: Third Annual Report: 2015 – 2016. The Chief Coroner therefore recommends that the Lord Chancellor gives consideration to amending his Exceptional Funding Guidance (Inquests)35 so as to provide exceptional funding for legal representation for the family where the state has agreed to provide separate representation for one or more interested persons. 2015 Harris Review Changing Prisons, Changing Lives: Report of the Independent Review into Self Inflicted Deaths in Custody of 18-24 year olds by Lord Toby Harris. Families of the deceased should have a right to non-means tested public funding for legal representation at an inquest. 2007 Corston Report A report by Baroness Jean Corston of a review of women with particular vulnerabilities in the criminal justice system. Public funding must be provided for bereaved families for proper legal representation at inquests relating to deaths in state custody that engage the state’s obligations under Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights. Funding should not be means tested and any financial eligibility test should be removed whenever Article 2 is engaged. Funding should also cover reasonable travel, accommodation and subsistence costs of families’ attendance at inquests. 2004 Joint Committee on Human Rights Deaths in custody, Third Report of Session 2004-05, Vol 1 2004. Participation of the next of kin in the investigation into a death in custody is an essential ingredient of Article 2 compliance… In all cases of deaths in custody, funding of legal assistance should be provided to the next of kin. 2003 Independent Review of the Coroners Services - Commissioned by the Home Office, chaired by Tom Luce Death Certification and Investigation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland: the Report of a Fundamental Review. We consider that the inquest should so far as possible be conducted in a style that is accessible to unrepresented lay people, and that the current criteria for awarding legal aid at inquests are broadly satisfactory. We recommend, however, that there should be a more liberal interpretation of the criteria in cases where a public authority is represented. 1999 Macpherson – Stephen Lawrence Inquiry Report of the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry. That consideration be given to the provision of Legal Aid to victims or the families of victims to cover representation at an Inquest in appropriate cases.