The Minister for Justice has said he will not back down in a row with solicitors over legal aid.
Yesterday, criminal solicitors began a two day work stoppage in protest at the introduction of a €520 flat fee for criminal legal aid cases heard in the District Courts.
A further three day work stoppage is planned for next week as well.
Solicitors argue a flat fee does not reflect the “complexity” of the work they perform and believe it will put “the most vulnerable in our society” at risk.
On The Claire Byrne Show, Jim O’Callaghan defended his decision to introduce a flat fee, adding that his Department has had extensive engagement with the Law Society since October last year.
“As Minister for Justice, I would have been completely negligent in my duties if I didn’t take into account that the cost of criminal legal aid in the District Court has increased by over 100% since 2015,” he explained.
“The old fee payment was €240 for the first appearance and then €60 for each appearance after that; I've introduced a flat fee of €520, which is the equivalent of five appearances, the €240 plus €460.
“That, I believe, is appropriate and fair, considering that the research I conducted shows that the average length of time for a criminal legal aid district court case is five appearances.”
The Fianna Fáil TD continued that he is “happy” to meet the Law Society next week and will “consider” their concerns.
However, he added that the status quo cannot continue.
“We're going to go back to the old system,” he said.
“Where an individual is before the District Court on, say, 40 charges of stealing from a shop - so, it's stealing 40 different items.
“The practice that has developed is that solicitors are charging a fee and spreading it around the solicitor's firm of 240 or slightly lower than that for each charge.
“So, that means that when you get into the District Court for one charge in terms of theft, it costs a significant amount of money.
“I regard that as a system that I cannot stand over and that has to change.”
However, despite his willingness to meet with the Law Society, Minister O’Callaghan said that he remains committed to a flat fee.
“The flat fee is going to stay - okay,” he insisted.
“The principle of the flat fee is going to stay, I'm not going to allow a situation where there's a system of payment in place which incentivises adjournments - and that exists at present.
“I appeal to people to read the document that they put up on the Department of Justice website, which involved research of 350,000 criminal cases in the district court between 2022 and 2023; the detail in it is unanswerable.”
Main image: Justice Minister Jim O'Callaghan. Picture by: Alamy.com.
