May 18, 2022
Legal aid unfixable with money
There’s a call for a complete overhaul of the legal aid system.
Sue Moroney, chief executive of Community Law Centres o Aotearoa, says while there’s an immediate need for more money to deal with more cases and the impact of Covid-19 on the courts, the overall system is broken.
She told Radio Waatea talkback host Matthey Tukaki that the situation is especially dire in the family court and youth justice areas, where people can’t find a lawyer to represent them because pay rates have slipped so far behind what they can get from private work.
“The people who can afford to pay the $300, $400 an hour for a lawyer quite frankly haven’t got the most complex situations and the most complex lives. It’s the low income people whose situations are very complex. Private law firms find it difficult to take those clients on because the cases are complex, they do cost that firm I guess an opportunity cost for other work they could take on that would be more lucrative for them. So we just don’t think that model is sustainable,” Ms Moroney says.
She says it’s time to assess how well the Public Defence Service being trialled in south Auckland is working and whether it should be rolled out through the country.