Authors:Professor Graham Cookson
Created:2014-07-01
Last updated:2023-09-18
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What is the business case for social welfare advice services?
Professor Graham Cookson, Professor of Economic & Public Policy in the Faculty of Business, Economics and Law at the University of Surrey, is co-author with Dr Freda Mold, Research Fellow and literature review expert at the University of Surrey, of a recently published academic report, The business case for social welfare advice services: an evidence review. In this article, he provides an introduction to its key findings and recommendations. A copy of the lay summary of the report is included with this issue.
Following the implementation of the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders (LASPO) Act in April 2013, which removed most of civil and family law from the scope of legal aid, it was widely anticipated that there would be a dramatic increase in the demand for advice services, especially in the areas of social welfare law. The Low Commission, with funding from The Baring Foundation, commissioned us to review the extant literature to determine whether the evidence supported a business case for investment in social welfare advice services.
The full, academic report is available online and a lay summary is included with this issue of
Legal Action, which I encourage you to read.
1The full report is available at: www.lowcommission.org.uk. In preparing our report, we reviewed almost 7,000 pieces of information, from which almost 700 were selected for closer scrutiny and 44 reports or articles were subjected to a full review. So, what does the evidence suggest?
The good news
There was universal agreement in the literature that advice results in positive outcomes for clients and their households. All of the studies we reviewed concluded that legal aid not only pays for itself, but also makes a significant contribution to households, local economies and in reducing public expenditure. For example, a study by Citizens Advice estimated that for every £1 spent on legal aid, the state saves:
•£2.34 from legal aid spent on housing advice;
•£2.98 from legal aid spent on debt advice;
•£8.80 from legal aid spent on benefits advice; and
•£7.13 from legal aid spent on employment advice.
The evidence is similar for the case of general (ie, non-legal aid) social welfare advice. These problems tend to cluster and therefore getting good, early advice may solve or even prevent multiple problems, and generate economic value to individuals, their creditors, local and central government and the wider economy. For instance, housing and homelessness charity Shelter estimated that each mortgage debt advice case costs the state £229 on average, while potentially saving the state the cost of repossession, estimated at £16,000.
Problems with the evidence
However, almost all of the evidence originated from the ‘grey’ or informally published literature, where the quality of the evidence was in general poor, and where the evidence had not been subjected to independent, peer review. A clear problem throughout the literature was the lack of a consistent or universally adopted measure of outcome or quality. Very few studies used recognised methodologies to appraise services (for example, cost-benefit analysis) and those that did provided too little information on their data and methodologies. In a number of studies, valuing the benefits of advice services appears to have involved some rather heroic assumptions that are not well justified.
Recommendations
A number of recommendations emerge from the review. Primarily, we need higher quality evidence, which requires robust evaluation methodologies (for example, cost-benefit analysis) and better data collection. Future evaluations could be aided by more consistent and routine outcomes monitoring within advice bodies, which in turn could be used to reward organisations by outcomes rather than case volume. There was support for innovation in payment systems for advice providers.
There were a number of recommendations for government and policymakers. These focused on extending the scale and scope of advice services, for example, to include a wider range of preventative services, such as training in financial management. There was a call for greater collaboration between organisations and the government to provide a more comprehensive, joined-up service. The UK government should improve the infrastructure of legal advice to ensure sustainable provision, and continue to provide core funding over the longer term to meet the cost of activities to support advice services.
In summary
Accepting the generally poor quality of most of the evidence, the results are consistent in demonstrating a positive effect of advice. The main conclusion that must be drawn from this review is that further research in this area would be helpful to inform decision-making. However, it is encouraging that the extant evidence is so consistent and positive. A more robust, well-designed and large study should confirm these findings if they are true.