The London Criminal Courts Solicitors’ Association is calling on defence lawyers nationwide doing publicly funded work to join the trade union Unite, to give the sector more clout in negotiations with the government over legal aid.

Edward Jones, senior associate at Kingsley Napley and LCCSA president, said there are no plans for immediate industrial action, but union representation would strengthen the hand of defence lawyers. ‘Only a properly unionised workforce has the ability to make government more receptive to reasonable requests for increased legal aid funding, which will lead to better pay and conditions overall,’ he explained.

He said owners of defence firms are supportive of LCCSA’s call for their staff to unionise.

In November 2021, the Independent Review of Criminal Legal Aid by Sir Christopher Bellamy KC recommended an immediate 15 per cent increase in criminal legal aid fees, which has yet to be fully implemented. Earlier this year, the then government lost a judicial review over its failure to uplift fees by the 15 per cent, with the court concluding that the system ‘is slowly coming apart at the seams’ (R (Law Society of England and Wales) v Lord Chancellor [2024] EWHC 155 (Admin) at para 176). The new government has yet to publish detailed plans for legal aid.