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experts give their opinion on the effect on ordinary people in the light of reforms Ken Clarke to the law of public finance

"I truly believe access to justice is the hallmark of a civilized society." With these words, that the Attorney General, Ken Clarke, has introduced legal reforms supported by the government last November . They are the most radical reforms of the system since it was introduced as a building block in the architecture of the welfare state after the war.

Clarke

amount of work plans for the demolition of the law publicly funded. Their proposals are based on the reduction of 350 pounds with a budget of £ 2.1 billion. While Clarke did for the legal aid system if they were not convinced that the real access to justice is so important to our civilization?

And what is that "access to justice" means that, if not a fully-funded legal aid? Is it a noble aspiration to raise our hearts, or a load of Tosh is sold by the political sense and lawyers according to their own selfish ends?

These are questions that I asked the leader of the lawyers, thinkers and activists last week. Roger Smith, Director of Justice, has spent his career in the access to justice for the first line and begin to work at Camden Law Centre in 1973. "Frankly, I think the term is best avoided by all," says Smith. "In its original design had a precise definition, but brought to its roots is totally meaningless."

It comes from the Italian jurist Mauro Cappelletti.

In the decade of 1970, Cappelletti led a research project funded by the Ford Foundation on "access to justice in modern societies", which leads to a series of four volumes ( called, you guessed access to justice). Cappelletti once said: "The right of" access to justice "has become effective with the new social rights is indeed of paramount importance ... access effective to justice can be seen as the most basic requirement, the most basic human right. a system designed to ensure legal rights. "

In the UK, has been regularly used and abused (1996, Lord Woolf's 1999 report New Labour, do so). James Sandbach, policy director at the service of Citizens Advice, said he has always been "a contested concept - what we mean by" access "to say nothing of" justice'?"

He says the consensus of the postwar period was that legal remedies should not be exclusive of any other sector of society and "certainly not a commodity to all but the rich."

He adds: ".. Legal aid and public service offices were established to help those who lack the skills elbows, income, or wish to receive fair This is a fundamental principle of the rule of law "

Sandbach said
is a control point of the quality of counsel Michael Mansfield. It is "a much broader concept that access to the courts and litigation," he said. "It includes the recognition that everyone is entitled to the protection of the law and that rights are meaningless if they can be applied. It is the protection of ordinary people and the most vulnerable and solve their problems."

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