Hitler discusses the legal aid reforms

Hitler discusses the legal aid reforms

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TTwiggy

11,500 posts

203 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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RYH64E said:
plasticpig said:
Average is around £25K for a legal aid solicitor. A senior partner in a small town firm will make around £45k. The big money is in corporate stuff.
My brother-in-law is a solicitor, he's in his late forties and a partner in a small London firm who do a lot of union work. The firm is on it's arse, working on the basis that bills and staff get paid first and the partners share what's left, he often takes home less than I pay some of my production workers. His wife, my sister, earns more as a teacher.
I was on the jury of a long fraud case two years ago that involved mortgage fraud. As part of the evidence, the earnings of one of the partners in a particular firm were read out in court.

It was astonishing to see that this witness, who was a co-owner of the firm, was taking home less than £25k a year (until, that is, they turned the firm into a conveyancing conveyor belt, and his earnings shot up to a big six-figure sum).

Andy Zarse

10,868 posts

246 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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Breadvan72 said:
A topical Downfall mashup. This one is quite good, and pretty much spot on.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPTaFRZSzI4&fea...
The whole Downfall meme became hopelessly tired after Hitler had trouble with the camshafts on his BMW G/S1200. It's as tired as supposed professionals complaining about how poorly they're paid. I had a terrible row with a doctor on here once (968?) complaining of how his new NHS contract forced him to be paid too much. He was appalled an ordinary MoP should query the veracity of his point.

My personal view is legal aid should not be allowed for asylumn cases. All such work should be pro-bono or funded by charitable donation, and hey, you can offset donations against tax!

JagLover

42,266 posts

234 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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Breadvan72 said:
Leg

This is not about the deficit. The saving will be very small in the overall scheme of things, and far more is wasted elsewhere. This is a consciously ideological attack on the rule of law by an authoritarian government. The next government, even if labour, will probably be just as authoritarian, as such is the trend nowadays.
On the contrary it has everything to do with the deficit. Because with a deficit at that level the government has to identify entire areas from which it will withdraw entirely, tinkering around the edges will not suffice. One of those areas identified is civil legal aid and if I were prioritising government expenditure that is exactly the sort of, worthy on occassion, but non-essential area I would withdraw funding.

The savings might only be in the hundreds of millions, but the point is that is only a part of an overall package of deficit reduction.

JagLover

42,266 posts

234 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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TTwiggy said:
It was astonishing to see that this witness, who was a co-owner of the firm, was taking home less than £25k a year (until, that is, they turned the firm into a conveyancing conveyor belt, and his earnings shot up to a big six-figure sum).
For the sake of balance I used to work for a client who specialised in criminal legal aid. His profit in a year never dropped below 6 figures.

Victor McDade

4,395 posts

181 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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Andy Zarse said:
My personal view is legal aid should not be allowed for asylumn cases. All such work should be pro-bono or funded by charitable donation, and hey, you can offset donations against tax!
It's hard to argue against this. There should be strict citizenship or residency requirements for legal aid. Under the current system we have things like this happening. They ended up getting more than a quarter of a million pounds.





Edited by Victor McDade on Wednesday 29th May 18:01

anonymous-user

Original Poster:

53 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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Ozzie Osmond said:
Oh yes? So how much do these people actually earn? Or are their peanuts actually coconut-sized?

How much career risk do they take each day when they go to work? How much commitment do they need to show in order to secure their modest crust? How safe is their role?

And are these the same people whose "clients" are Afghans in detainment in Afghanistan? Looks to me like another day out on the UK taxpayers' gravy train.
See above. The peanuts are, I would say, peanut sized, especially in the context of graduate professional earnings.

Career risk? Often quite a lot. You a re only as good as your last case.

Commitment? A 2.1 or higher degree, and then one or two years post graduate training, and then one or two years on the job training. The law courses cost five figures sums. Student debts, and no guarantee of a job at the end of the training. So, some commitment. I'd say.

Safe? Lawyers feel recessions too, and add to this the current changes. Redundancies are not rare, even amongst the big firms, and the small firms are closing down, in many cases. There will be areas of the north of England where, if your violent partner beats you up, or your dodgy landlord changes the locks, or the council comes to take your children, the nearest legal aid lawyer may be 80 miles away, and you won't have a car or be able to afford public transport that far.

As for detainees in Afghanistan, why should our forces overseas be entitled to detain people without trial? If we go to war for democracy and civil society, we should behave like a democracy and civil society, at least when not actually shooting people who are opposed to those things.

As Lord Atkin said in 1942, when the baddies were much worse baddies than our current baddies:-

"In England, amidst the clash of arms, the laws are not silent. They may be changed, but they speak the same language in war as in peace. It has always been one of the pillars of freedom, one of the principles of liberty for which on recent authority we are now fighting, that the judges are no respecters of persons and stand between the subject and any attempted encroachments on his liberty by the executive, alert to see that any coercive action is justified in law."


Edited by anonymous-user on Wednesday 29th May 18:11

Jasandjules

69,825 posts

228 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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It disheartens me greatly to see so many keen to see the protection of the law removed from the less fortunate.

I trust that in the event you ever get wrongly accused of a crime that you will be happy to pay out of your own pockets to defend yourself.

I should add that I do not undertake any legal aid work myself so cui bono does not apply to my views.

Andy Zarse

10,868 posts

246 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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Jasandjules said:
It disheartens me greatly to see so many keen to see the protection of the law removed from the less fortunate.

I trust that in the event you ever get wrongly accused of a crime that you will be happy to pay out of your own pockets to defend yourself.

I should add that I do not undertake any legal aid work myself so cui bono does not apply to my views.
It's called no win no fee.

JagLover

42,266 posts

234 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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Jasandjules said:
It disheartens me greatly to see so many keen to see the protection of the law removed from the less fortunate.

I trust that in the event you ever get wrongly accused of a crime that you will be happy to pay out of your own pockets to defend yourself.
Given the changes don't apply to legal aid in criminal cases I don't really see the relevance of your post.

Ozzie Osmond

21,189 posts

245 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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plasticpig said:
Average is around £25K for a legal aid solicitor. A senior partner in a small town firm will make around £45k.
I calculate that lower figure amount to actual pay of £14.30 per hour. If those figures are correct, they truly are peanuts by professional standards.

Anyone else care to chip in what solicitors actually earn? Or how those figures compare with other jobs?

Andy Zarse

10,868 posts

246 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
quotequote all
Ozzie Osmond said:
plasticpig said:
Average is around £25K for a legal aid solicitor. A senior partner in a small town firm will make around £45k.
I calculate that lower figure amount to actual pay of £14.30 per hour. If those figures are correct, they truly are peanuts by professional standards.

Anyone else care to chip in what solicitors actually earn? Or how those figures compare with other jobs?
Have a flip through this... smile

http://jobs.lawgazette.co.uk/

anonymous-user

Original Poster:

53 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
quotequote all
Solicitors and barristers at the top end earn six figure sums before tax, and in a few cases seven figure sums, but those are the ones working in the swankiest law firms and chambers. Many solicitors and most barristers earn reasonable amounts - high five figures or low six. Many more are in the low to medium five figures bracket.



Edited by anonymous-user on Wednesday 29th May 21:39

JagLover

42,266 posts

234 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
quotequote all
Ozzie Osmond said:
I calculate that lower figure amount to actual pay of £14.30 per hour. If those figures are correct, they truly are peanuts by professional standards.
I wonder how efficiently many legal firms are run.

Provincial Accountancy firms have charge out rate for staff that tend to range from £25 to £130 (for senior managers) an hour, considerable lower than that of solicitors but I have never seen a poor equity partner! (aside from one very poorly run practice)

PlankWithANailIn

439 posts

148 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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Most small firms are run very badly. The time taken to actually bill for work done is shocking. Taking an active role in speeding the process up would help, 1 case at £1,000 per week or 10 cases at a £500, do the maths! Barristers are even worse.

Cash flow......whats that?

Still the cuts to Legal Aid being proposed are too much for the profession, its just not going to be profitable. Either the proposals will be withdrawn or they will go the whole hog and just get rid of Civil Legal Aid. By the way the latest proposals mostly effect Criminal Legal Aid, 17.5% reduction in fees across the board. Some paid for work being will be cut completely and solicitors expected to do it for free. Civil Legal Aid has already been cut, effective (mostly) from April this year.

By 2015 the Legal Aid budget will have been slashed nearly in half in real terms. But that's the ticket the conservatives stood on so cant complain really.

McWigglebum4th

32,414 posts

203 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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As someone who made the mistake of getting a job i'll never get legal aid

So not bothered about it ending

Jasandjules

69,825 posts

228 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
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JagLover said:
Given the changes don't apply to legal aid in criminal cases I don't really see the relevance of your post.
http://www.lawsociety.org.uk/news/stories/leading-academics-warn-legal-aid-cuts-could-have-devastating-effects/

Ozzie Osmond

21,189 posts

245 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
quotequote all
McWigglebum4th said:
As someone who made the mistake of getting a job i'll never get legal aid

So not bothered about it ending
Your point is well made.

It's like council housing - where people without jobs can afford to live in central London but people WITH jobs can't afford it.

No doubt Abu Qatada gets the full package of council housing AND legal aid. I'm so glad to be a taxpayer...



anonymous-user

Original Poster:

53 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
quotequote all
McWigglebum4th said:
As someone who made the mistake of getting a job i'll never get legal aid

So not bothered about it ending
A commendably PH style "the world extends no further than the confines of my house/car/family; financial weakness reflects moral weakness; I shall never encounter misfortune, and everyone else can go hang " attitude!

Andy Zarse

10,868 posts

246 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
quotequote all
Breadvan72 said:
McWigglebum4th said:
As someone who made the mistake of getting a job i'll never get legal aid

So not bothered about it ending
A commendably PH style "the world extends no further than the confines of my house/car/family; financial weakness reflects moral weakness; I shall never encounter misfortune, and everyone else can go hang " attitude!
Precisely how you conflate his point to this grandiose tripe is totally and utterly beyond me.

anonymous-user

Original Poster:

53 months

Wednesday 29th May 2013
quotequote all
You have perhaps missed a session or two in the Irony 101 course. Irony apart, the point seems to convey pretty well the sentiment, which appears to be prevalent on PH, that if a problem does not impact on you individually, it matters not at all.