The report includes a consideration of the current and historical legal aid system, accounts of a number of individual case examples that the panel heard from people who had crucially benefited from legal aid, and an interrogation of arguments for cutting the legal aid budget found in the Government's 'green paper' on the issue and from a number of other organisations. In a highly insightful analysis in Appendix 2, the report considers whether any of the people who gave accounts to the panel would have lost out had the proposed cuts already been in place, and finds that a large number of them would have.
The findings of this impartial panel are highly relevant for all members and supporters of RAPAR, and include, among other things, that:
- Legal aid is vital in protecting the rights of vulnerable people
- Legal aid is vital in upholding the rule of law
- Legal aid is essential to holding the state to account
- Cutting legal aid is a false economy