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Access to Criminal Justice: Legal Aid, Lawyers and The Defence of Liberty

NCJ Number
176038
Editor(s)
R Young, D Wall
Date Published
1996
Length
390 pages
Annotation
This book examines legal aid and its importance in defending liberty and achieving justice.
Abstract
Drawing on empirical research findings and socio-legal analysis, the book explores the reasons why legally aided lawyers have failed, by and large, to turn the theories that underlie legal aid into a practical reality. Individual chapters discuss: (1) criminal justice, legal aid, and the defense of liberty; (2) the development of criminal legal aid in England and Wales; (3) legal aid, human rights and criminal justice; (4) whether defending liberty undermines citizenship; (5) the role of legal aid in legitimating criminal justice; (6) solicitors and applications for criminal legal aid; (7) court clerks, discretion and the determination of legal aid applications; (8) reviews by caseworkers and area committees of refusals of criminal legal aid applications; (9) controlling laywyers' costs through standard fees; (10) whether criminal legal aid expenditure is supplier or system driven (the case of Scotland); (11) legal firms, lawyers' attitudes and criminal legal aid in Scotland; (12) access to justice in the police station; (13) the reform of criminal legal aid; (14) criminal legal aid reforms and the restructuring of legal professionalism; and (15) alternatives to prosecution. Notes, tables, figures, bibliography, index