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Forum Home  →  Discussion  →  Access to justice and advice sector issues  →  Thread

New Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor Liz Truss

Paul_Treloar_AgeUK
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We have a new Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor, Liz Truss, MP for South West Norfolk. Not only is she not from a legal background (for the third appointment running in this post) but there was something nagging me about her name that I couldn’t recall why.

Then I happened across reading some of the Committee debates when the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Bill, which scrapped legal aid for welfare benefits as well as various other areas of social welfare law, was being debated and I remembered why a chill ran down my spine.

Q 246 Elizabeth Truss (South West Norfolk) (Con):  Is it not the case that quite a few of these issues are not strictly legal matters? At the moment, Britain treats them as legal matters, which is why we have such a high legal aid bill compared to other countries. If you look at the scope of legal aid in other countries, you see that it is narrower, and there is a lower income threshold. On issues such as the welfare system, should we not improve services at source so that fewer errors are, for example, made in the benefits system in the first place that require legal redress? Do you agree with the general principle that it is wrong to spend all this money on legal services when strictly legal issues are not the reason why the problems have been caused in the first place?

Ann Lewis: I think we would all agree that if the benefits system could be made more straightforward and less legalistic, that would be a good thing. However, at the moment it is legalistic and complex. I have quotes from judges, which I will not read out to you, who use words like “labyrinthine” and “bewildering” when talking about the benefits system. Before I came this morning, I checked out the handbook that is used by many welfare benefit advisers, the Child Poverty Action Group handbook. It has 1,600 pages and refers to 45 Acts of Parliament and 185 regulations. The system at the moment is complex and some people in the system need specialist welfare benefit advice. That is our view.

Elizabeth Truss:  Does that advice necessarily have to be legal?

Public Bill Committee
Thursday 14 July 2011

nevip
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Welfare rights adviser - Sefton Council, Liverpool

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past caring
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Welfare Rights Adviser - Southwark Law Centre, Peckham

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Paul_Treloar_AgeUK - 28 July 2016 10:37 AM

Elizabeth Truss:  Does that advice necessarily have to be legal?

Public Bill Committee
Thursday 14 July 2011

Probably not if it’s coming from the DWP.

C Browne
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Yes, but the advice is SUPPOSED to be legal (or accurate; that would do) or following their own guidance. Almost anything other than the nonsense that keeps us all so busy.

chacha
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Paul_Treloar_AgeUK - 28 July 2016 10:37 AM

Elizabeth Truss:  Does that advice necessarily have to be legal? </i>

Only in the current climate can a “Secretary of State for Justice”, never mind the party sitting, get away with that without even being castigated.

What????

Paul_Treloar_AgeUK
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nevip - 28 July 2016 12:03 PM

Ahem!

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/25/row-over-liz-truss-sexism-gender-law-lord-chancellor

Her reputation from those previous roles in education and environment, food and rural affairs is as an effective minister, although particularly passionate about British cheeses.

Cheese will be fine, justice will be toasted.

Paul_Treloar_AgeUK
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past caring - 28 July 2016 12:11 PM
Paul_Treloar_AgeUK - 28 July 2016 10:37 AM

Elizabeth Truss:  Does that advice necessarily have to be legal?

Public Bill Committee
Thursday 14 July 2011

Probably not if it’s coming from the DWP.

Thanks for cheering my day.