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<p>When reform began we had an unsustainably expensive legal aid system - costing
more than £2 billion every year. We still have a very generous system, last year we
spent £1.6bn on legal aid, around a quarter of the department’s expenditure.</p><br
/><p>Statistics on legal aid in England and Wales are published every quarter, presenting
the key statistics on workload and expenditure across both the criminal and civil
legal aid schemes. The statistics are available via <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/legal-aid-statistics"
target="_blank">https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/legal-aid-statistics</a>.
The vast majority of legal aid work is carried out by solicitors working in the private
sector. It is difficult to summarise workloads across the legal aid system meaningfully
within a single number because there is no single definition of a case that applies
to all of the diverse services being provided, so users of legal aid statistics are
best advised to look at trends in workload for each area of legal aid separately.</p><br
/><p>For many areas of civil law, the implementation of the Legal Aid, Sentencing
and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (LASPO) led to a reduction of workload for solicitors
in areas where legal aidwas reduced.</p><br /><p>LASPO did not change eligibility
or scope in relation to criminal legal aid.</p><br />
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