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Legal Aid: Expenditure

Volume 470: debated on Thursday 24 January 2008

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice how much was spent on legal aid in each of the last 10 years (a) in cash terms and (b) as a proportion of annual total public expenditure. (181012)

Table 1 as follows shows legal aid cash expenditure in each of the last 10 years. Table 2 as follows shows that expenditure for both England and Wales and for Northern Ireland as a proportion of total managed expenditure. Legal aid in Scotland is a devolved matter, funded out of the Scottish block grant which also forms part of total managed expenditure.

When compared to other main domestic areas of public spending, legal aid has been one of the fastest growing areas of public sector spending over the past years. For example, the average annual real-terms growth of legal aid over the past 25 years to 2006-07 was 5.7 per cent. This compares with 4.4 per cent. for social care and protection; 4.2 per cent. for public order and safety; 4.1 per cent. for health and 1.9 per cent. for education.

Table 1

£ million, net

England and Wales

Northern Ireland

Total

1997-98

1529.6

28.9

1,558

1998-99

1628.1

30.1

1,658

1999-2000

1550.1

34.7

1,585

2000-01

1663.7

37.7

1,701

2001-02

1717.0

41.5

1,759

2002-03

1908.5

45.0

1,954

2003-04

2076.7

49.9

2,127

2004-05

2038.0

58.9

2,097

2005-06

2027.8

57.5

2,085

2006-07

1980.3

69.0

2,049

Table 2

Percentage

England and Wales

Northern Ireland

Total

1997-98

0.47

0.01

0.48

1998-99

0.49

0.01

0.50

1999-2000

0.45

0.01

0.46

2000-01

0.46

0.01

0.47

2001-02

0.44

0.01

0.45

2002-03

0.45

0.01

0.46

2003-04

0.46

0.01

0.47

2004-05

0.41

0.01

0.43

2005-06

0.39

0.01

0.40

2006-07

0.36

0.01

0.37