Policy and Campaign Articles
from Legal Action magazine
A range of articles covering LAG, its policy and its history that have appeared in Legal Action over the years.
Legal aid: fighting for the future
Jon Robins reports back from LAG’s well-attended ‘Legal aid: fighting for the future’ event, held in parliament on 27 March 2023.
In April 2023, it will be ten years since the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 came into force. Sue James reports from Hammersmith and Fulham, in a new series on the state of legal aid across England and Wales, and the fight for its survival.
In the second of this series on the state of legal aid across England and Wales, Tessa Lieven Wright speaks to three organisations in Manchester about how they and their clients are surviving austerity and the cost of living crisis.
In the third of this series on the state of legal aid across England and Wales, Tessa Lieven Wright speaks to three inspiring organisations in Brighton, working against the odds to support asylum-seekers and other migrants, in a sector on the verge of collapse.
Editorials
A selection of editorial articles from LAG CEO, Sue James.
LAG strategy
It has been an interesting time to think through the priorities for LAG, resolving our strategy for the next three years and beyond, says Ros Bragg, chair of LAG.
LAG’s 50th anniversary
Legal Action’s prolific ‘Housing: recent developments’ authors, Jan Luba KC, Nic Madge and Sam Madge-Wyld, give Sue James their reflections on decades of helping lawyers to help their clients.
Andrew Arden KC looks back over 50 years of his involvement in housing law.
In a time when immigration law and asylum rights are at the forefront of everyone’s minds, we provide a potted history of LAG’s asylum and immigration law coverage, and hear from two of our wonderful and long-time authors, Jawaid Luqmani and Sue Willman.
Legal aid has been at the centre of LAG’s work since its earliest days. Sue James provides a brief history, and examines what we can learn from other jurisdictions and why we need to fight for it now more than ever.
Professor Leslie Thomas KC reflects on how things have improved for bereaved families at inquests, but why we must not be complacent.
Ed Cape reflects on LAG’s first five decades and the development of police station law and practice following the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984.
During LAG’s first 50 years, prison law emerged as a distinct area of practice. Simon Creighton and Hamish Arnott look back to its beginnings and explore how things have – and have not – improved.
Philip Tsamados reflects on three decades of covering employment law developments.
Marc Willers KC and Chris Johnson reflect on the key battles to protect the rights of Gypsy and Traveller communities over the past 20 years and beyond, and LAG’s role in supporting the small band of lawyers willing to take this fight on.
LAG celebrates the work of those committed community care practitioners who have shared their knowledge via LAG’s books, Legal Action, training courses and conferences over decades. But this article is a warning as well as a celebration: we have a collapsing system of social care provision and an area of legal practice heading for extinction, write two of LAG’s most experienced contributors, Luke Clements and Karen Ashton.
Stephen Cragg KC and Maya Sikand KC look back over 35 years of actions against the police, noting that while there have been some improvements, practitioners in this area are likely to remain busy for the foreseeable future.
Angela Jackman KC (Hon) and Eleanor Wright started working together not long before they began writing for Legal Action nearly 20 years ago, and have seen many changes in education law over that period, largely but not entirely reflecting political and economic developments. Here, they summarise some of the main developments in the field over that time.
Catherine Casserley and Douglas Johnson provide a whistlestop tour of five decades of discrimination law in celebration of LAG’s 50th.
Sally Robertson looks back over 50 years of LAG’s social security law coverage.
LASPO review
Articles on the LASPO review by LAG's then-director Steve Hynes.
Other policy articles
Lucy Logan Green and James Sandbach report on the dire consequences of the civil legal aid cuts for access to justice and associated knock-on costs in other public services, and provide six recommendations to government to halt the crisis.
Keir Starmer KC, Doughty Street Chambers, presented LAG's 2013 annual lecture event: 'Prosecuting in the public interest: CPS guidelines from assisted suicide to social media' on 5 December 2013.
LAG's Immigration and Asylum Law Project was launched in November 2012 and aims to monitor and, where possible, mitigate the impact of legal aid cuts in this area and promote a more balanced debate about immigration and asylum in the media.