Legal Aid
The rules regarding eligibility for legal aid are different if you have suffered Domestic Violence and you wish to apply for a Non-Molestation or an Occupation Order. If you wish to apply for either or both of these orders you will automatically qualify for Legal Aid, regardless of your resources or income. The trouble with this is that if you are on a higher income or if you have savings or own your own property then the Legal Services Commission, who assess people’s eligibility for legal aid, will ask you to make a contribution, which in some cases can be higher than the amount that you would pay if you were paying for legal services privately. In addition, if you apply for an Occupation Order and the Court grants you the right to remain in the house then your legal fees may need to be paid out of the value of the house. This is called the Statutory Charge and you will be fully advised about this at your first appointment if it applies to you.
For other family matters, to be eligible for legal aid you must not have savings or capital of more than £8000 or a gross income of more than £2530. The first £100,000 of capital in your home is ignored as is £100,000 of your mortgage. Your disposable income should not be greater than £698. It is important to remember that the closer your income and capital are to these limits, the higher the contribution will be that the Legal Services Commission will expect you to make out of your resources. We will be able to give you an estimate of what this contribution will be, but this will be purely based on the figures you supply us with and the Legal Services Commission may produce a final figure for your contribution that is either higher or lower.
Your gross income is calculated by adding together all the money you have coming in, before tax or National Insurance is deducted. This includes any overtime payments, Child Benefit and any other benefits, maintenance and any other money that you may receive. Although all your incomings are included in calculating your gross income, not all your outgoings will be deducted from this figure in calculating your disposable income. Your outgoings that will be deducted are tax, National Insurance, mortgage or rent payments and childcare costs because of work. Household bills and expenses are not deducted.
You may think that the assessment of eligibility for legal aid is very complicated and we would agree with you! But don’t worry too much about the details; your solicitor will advise you fully regarding this when you come in to see us and answer all your questions.
The Legal Services Commission can take several weeks or sometimes even longer to calculate your application for legal aid. If they assess you as being eligible for legal aid then they will send you a certificate to confirm this. Your certificate will last as long as your case.
If your case is an emergency then it may not be possible for you to wait several weeks for the Legal Services Commission to complete their assessment. In such cases, then we can grant you a certificate ourselves immediately, although this is really a temporary certificate and the Legal Services Commission will still need to carry out their assessment. For this reason it is very important that you can give us full and accurate financial information when you first come in to see us. The reality is that if you do not mention all sources of income then the Legal Services Commission might decide you are not eligible for Legal Aid and you would then have to pay any costs we have incurred yourself. Obviously this is the last thing we want to happen, so it’s important you help us get your assessment right.
