I am in retirement having cause to reflect why legal aid franchises did not work for me
I am sure that if I had known then what I know now I would like so many firms in 1998 have dropped legal aid and taken a chance on survival- though to be fair on reviewing press cuttings a lot of what I now know was being said at the time
The key point seems to be not so much low rates of pay as the loss of up to 70% precious prime fee-earning time to excessive administration
A more insidious element was the way that franchising prevented the practitioner from working effectively as a professional
Every official move towards franchising was preceded by negative publicity first about Dodgy High Street Practitioners fiddling Green Form Claims and then the naming and shaming of firms grossing more than £1m a year from legal aid
This together with the frustating excessive hours on record keeping often at unsocial hours tended to undermine professional self confidence and the ability to give good advice and provide effective representation
The under performance was reflected in poor audit results and falling into the countless traps for the unwary and sanctions for late claims-it was all downhill
Unfortunately the Law Society so strong in their representations in support of franchised firms did not do a lot to warn solicitors about the dangers of committing themselves in the first place-and they seem to have their own agenda with small firms in general and sole practitioners in particular
