Barristers seek reversal of fee cuts imposed in recession

Demands by barristers for higher fees will have to take heed of the implications on the budgets of the Legal Aid Scheme and the Director of Public Prosecutions, the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform has said.

The Bar Council, which represents 2,200 barristers who are members of the Law Library, is lobbying for a reversal of fee cuts for prosecution work imposed at the outset of the financial crisis. Two 8 per cent cuts were imposed in 2009 and 2010, and the fees were also subjected to a further 10 per cent cut in 2011.

The latter cut was unique to lawyers and came about because of a decision by the then minister for justice, Alan Shatter, to reduce the cost of the Legal Aid scheme, which hit barristers doing criminal defence work.

However, Ireland runs a system whereby publicly funded barristers acting for the defence and the prosecution have parity of pay. Parity was retained by reducing the fees paid to prosecution barristers by 10 per cent also.

Request being examined

In a statement to

The Irish Times

, a spokeswoman for the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform said the request for pay restoration was being examined by the department and the DPP’s office.

The examinations would take into account the parity issue and the fact that increasing the fees paid for working for the DPP would have a “knock-on effect on fees payable under the criminal legal aid scheme”.

“In addition, consideration of the Bar Council’s approach will have due regard to the level of restoration of professional fees occurring in other sectors under the rollback of the Fempi [Financial Emergency Measures in the Public Interest] regime.”

The Bar Council submission, which has been seen by The Irish Times, says the current fees are causing new entrants to the Bar Council to "vote with their fee" and opt to practise in areas other than criminal law. "Apart from the immediate impact on morale of existing members, the long- term effect of these issues will be corrosive and most certainly not in the public interest."

The submission says that while the complexity of the work has increased, the fees being paid are at levels equivalent to those of 2002. Some time-consuming aspects of criminal prosecution work are now going essentially unpaid, according to the submission.