Yesterday the Ministry of Justice announced that immigration legal aid rates will be increased “as soon as operationally possible”. Overall spending on immigration legal aid will increase by 30%. There doesn’t seem to be much more detail at this stage, apart from the following:

The Government ran a consultation on increasing legal aid fees for those working in the housing (housing and debt) and immigration (immigration and asylum) sectors, proposing to increase fees to a rate in the region of £65/£69 per hour (non-London/London), or provide a 10% uplift, whichever is higher. Fixed fees will be uplifted by the same percentage as the increase in the underlying hourly rate for that work. This will be implemented as soon as operationally possible with costs scaling up to £20m at steady state. This will increase overall spend by 24% for housing and 30% for immigration.  

The changes would mean for example that the fixed fee for Housing work will increase by 42% from £157 to £223 and the fixed fee for asylum legal help will increase by 35% from £413 to £559.   

It is good to see recognition of the important role that legal aid plays within the asylum system, as the press release states that the increase “will help speed up decision-making in immigration cases”.