Reflections on the reconfiguration of access to justice |
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Authors: | Hilary Sommerlad |
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Affiliation: | Leeds Metropolitan University , UK |
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Abstract: | This paper draws on a series of research studies of the last two decades of legal aid reforms to consider their wider social and political meaning. They are evaluated against a ‘master ideal’ of access to justice rather than a fictive golden age. It will be argued that despite New Labour's rhetoric of social inclusion and the positive initiatives this sometimes produced, the neo-liberal character of the reforms has eroded both social rights and access to justice. Their internal logic requires the imposition of a market and the use of least cost labour, thereby reducing the guarantee of due process to the lowest common denominator: consumption of a legal service becomes a sufficient alternative to just outcomes. |
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