Securing access to justice: HIAS+JCORE signs joint legal aid briefing with 71 migration organisations

HIAS+JCORE has joined a coalition of organisations in signing a joint briefing on legal aid produced by JCWI and Migrants Organise.

The briefing calls for urgent changes to the legal aid system to allow people in need to access legal support.

With legal aid rates not having increased since 1996 (and in fact reduced by 10% in 2012), many firms are unable to undertake legal aid work. This is locking large numbers of people out of access justice – including those navigating the UK’s complex asylum system.

In 2023, more than half of those seeking asylum in this country had to do so without the support of a legal aid lawyer. This number is likely to grow even further, with a growing backlog of people in the asylum system, accompanied by increases in asylum appeals, partly resulting from previous poor-quality decision making on asylum claims.

The briefing makes four key recommendations:

• Cross-departmental solutions to a cross-departmental issue – overhaul the hostile approach to migration policy-making thereby decreasing reliance on legal aid.
• Ensure those in need of legal aid can access it – expand the scope of cases covered by legal aid to what it was before 2012.
• Urgently increase legal aid fee rates to ensure practitioners are paid for their work and to avoid knock-on costs elsewhere.
• End ‘legal aid deserts’ – ensure that there are legal aid providers available across the country, not just in certain regions

Full list of signatories:

• Action for Refugees in Lewisham
• Asylum Support Appeals Project
• Ashton Churches Asylum Project
• Assist Sheffield
• Asylos
• Asylum Aid
• Asylum Matters
• Bail for Immigration Detainees
• BEACON
• Boaz Trust
• Bristol Law
• Centre City of Sanctuary Sheffield
• Daaro Youth Project
• Darlington Assistance for Refugees
• Detention Action
• Devon and Cornwall Refugee Support
• Doncaster Conversation Club
• End Violence Against Women Coalition
• Freedom From Torture
• Gatwick Detainee Visitors Group
• Gloucesteshire Action for Refugees and Asylum Seekers (GARAS)
• Greater Manchester Immigration Aid Unit
• Helen Bamber Foundation
• HIAS+JCORE
• Hibiscus
• Happy Baby Community
• Haringey Migrant Support Centre
• Hope for Justice
• Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association
• Jesuit Refugee Service
• Kalayaan
• Latin American Women’s Rights Service
• Lewisham Refugee & Migrant Network
• Manchester Refugee Support Network
• Manuel Bravo Project
• Micro Rainbow
• Migrant Legal Project
• NACCOM – The No Accommodation Network
• North Yorkshire Citizens Advice & Law Centre
• One Strong Voice
• Penrith and Eden Refugee Network
• Public Law Project
• Project 17
• Reclaim the Sea
• Refugee Action
• Refugee Action York R
• efugee and Migrant Centre – Birmingham
• Refugee Asylum Seeker and Migrant Action
• Refugee Legal Support
• Refugee Support Devon
• Refugee Support Group Berkshire
• Refugees at Home
• Right to Remain
• RootsMove
• Samphire Southeast and East Asian Centre
• South London Refugee Association
• Southall Black Sisters
• Southampton and Winchester Visitors’ Group
• South Yorkshire Refugee Law and Justice
• St. Augustine’s Centre Halifax
• Together with Migrant Children
• Upbeat
• Voices in Exile
• Waging Peace
• West London Welcome
• Women for Refugee Women
• Work Rights Centre
• Young Roots