Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill

My Lords, I support the amendment and congratulate the Government on their imaginative development in relation to this matter, but I too accept that it should be mandatory rather than discretionary. As the noble Lord, Lord Howarth of Newport, mentioned, there is the problem of the unrepresented defendant—the bane of every judge’s life, particularly, if I may say so, that of the circuit judge. Often one found in a perhaps not uncomplicated situation two unrepresented defendants. One would have to spell out to them with bullet points essentially what the civil law is. One would then have to explain that if the claimant could on a balance of probability establish the case, he or she would succeed. If not, the other side, the defendant, would triumph. However, it is not really the unrepresented defendant, complicated though the situation is, that this matter deals with, but the person who has not made a claim at all and will possibly never make a claim. I think it must have been around 10 years ago that I saw a memorandum from the Law Society. It had conducted a comprehensive survey across the country and found that around 30 per cent of straightforward industrial claims which had every prospect of success were, for some reason or another, never pursued. That is the essential community that this piece of legislation is aimed at. Therefore I commend the Government on their imagination, but to my mind there is no earthly reason why it should not be mandatory rather than discretionary.