UN official says legal aid cuts will stop Trafigura-type victims’ cases

John Ruggie, UN special representative for business and human rights, warns justice minister changes will be damaging A senior UN official has warned the government that cuts to legal aid and changes to lawyers’ fees will prevent claims, such as those in the Trafigura case, being brought against multinational businesses. Professor John Ruggie, a Harvard University lawyer who is the UN secretary-general’s special representative for business and human rights, wrote to the UK justice minister Jonathan Djanogly saying he was concerned about the “disincentives” being introduced. The letter, sent last month, is a damaging critique of Ministry of Justice plans to cut £350m a year from the legal aid budget and reform conditional fee agreements so claimants would have to use any compensation to pay their lawyers’ success fees. Ken Clarke, the justice secretary, has made clear his desire to reduce “spiralling legal costs” and restrict no win, no fee agreements. A sentencing and legal aid bill is expected to be introduced into the Commons in the coming days. Ruggie’s letter, passed to opposition justice spokesman Andy Slaughter and seen by the Guardian, is a clear attempt to deflect the government from what he fears will be a damaging outcome. “Three related aspects of the proposed reforms could, when implemented together, constitute a significant barrier to legitimate business-related human rights claims being brought before UK courts in situations where alternative sources of remedy are unavailable,” he wrote. “Legal aid is no longer available in the UK for many cases against multinational enterprises and most such cases are currently funded through conditional fee agreements.” The plans would render such agreements too costly for claimants, he said. “It is quite possible that in complex human rights claims against businesses, the success fee could equal or even exceed the compensation awarded, given the financial risks for law firms of bringing such claims,” Ruggie explained.” Similar problems could deter personal injury claimants who might, even if successful, “walk out of court no better off than at the start of the litigation …The impact of this reform is likely to be significant.” It will be a “real disincentive to what is already a very small pool of lawyers willing to take on human rights-related cases against multinational enterprises”. The letter does not refer to Trafigura, but his concerns clearly encompass future similar cases. The British oil trading company was sued in a class action brought on behalf of thousands of west African victims who claimed they had been harmed by waste dumping in Ivory Coast. Martyn Day, a senior partner at the law firm Leigh Day & Co, which brought the case, welcomed Ruggie’s letter. “We acted for 30,000 impoverished Ivorians – the no win, no fee scheme was the only way we could bring the case,” he said. “We were facing Trafigura – one of the largest private companies in the world, worth many billions – and the costs in the case were astronomic. The expenses we had to pay out alone ran to many millions and we had a team of 50 lawyers working on the case. We simply could never have run the case if we did not have the prospect of obtaining the success fee from the defendants. There is no question but that our Ivorian clients would never have received justice if the proposed bill was in place at that time.”Slaughter said: “If cases like Trafigura aren’t brought to justice, it sends the worst kind of signal. Corporate wrongdoing will flourish around the world and lives will be lost. “It is yet another sign of extraordinary incompetence by Ken Clarke. This policy needs to be withdrawn and drastically revised before they try and force it through parliament.” The Corporate Responsibility coalition, which campaigns to hold multinationals to account, said it believed many similar actions against UK companies, including claims by South African miners for asbestos-related diseases, would no longer be feasible. The Labour MP Lisa Nandy, who campaigns on legal issues, said: “This government has ignored the views of NGOs and leading experts and chosen to plough ahead with proposals which will be devastating for victims of human rights abuses. “Structures for holding companies like Trafigura to account are few and far between. If the coalition is committed to human rights, the minister should be looking at how these can be strengthened, not weakened.” Clarke maintains that the British legal system is one of the most costly in the world and is determined to reduce the cost to the taxpayer of litigation. The MoJ has declined to confirm precisely when the bill will be published. Legal aid Trafigura Kenneth Clarke Owen Bowcott guardian.co.uk

Posted by on June 16, 2011. Filed under News, Politics, World News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.