Privatizing Access to Justice

Up to now, access to justice has been the privilege of the wealthy and the minority who are sufficiently poor to qualify for civil legal aid. Most other people had no access to civil justice, a factor which has brought the civil justice system into disrepute. The government is presently undertaking a major and long-overdue reform of the civil legal aid system in accordance with the Access to Justice Act 1999. Reforms enacted on 1 April 2000 abolish legal aid for most civil claims. Instead, it is expected that cases will be funded by the conditional fee system - popularly known as "no win, no fee". In this system the lawyer agrees with his client to charge an additional success fee if the claim is successful, but may charge nothing if the claim fails. It is an example of payment by result. These reforms effectively represent the privatisation of access to justice. The civil courts are increasingly accessible to anyone with a meritorious claim.

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The Road from Inequity

Town traffic causes by far the bulk of the congestion, pollution, accidents, and noise nuisance of driving - all of which cost society seven times what urban motorists pay in taxes. Rural drivers, by contrast, are overcharged three times for their use of the roads. For heavy vehicles in urban areas during peak-hours this discrepancy is even higher, claims the report, which proposes a £15 billion cut in the revenue collected in fuel duty, vehicle taxes and VAT. People driving in towns, however, would pay tolls averaging 5.6p per mile, with charges much higher at peak times and for high-polluting heavy vehicles.

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Response to the CAA

The Adam Smith Institute has told the Civil Aviation Authority that UK airports are over-regulated and under-competitive. This report by former airport director David Stanley says that the CAA should focus on safety regulation, that UK airports should be opened up to more competition, and that the economic regulation of airports should be passed to a new, independent regulator.

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Patient Centred Medical Regulation

5 per cent of doctors are estimated to be making the wrong decisions - that amounts to 5,000 doctors with 100,000 patients. There is a need for improved regulation of the medical profession with the emphasis centred on the patient. Currently the public is untrusting of the medical profession, This briefing paper sets out guidelines for a new shape to regulation.

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Housing Benefit: What the government ought to do – but won't

Radical changes to housing benefit are required in order to stem the £840 million of tax payers money lost annually to fraud and error, and to make the housing market fairer and more responsive to the needs of tenants. Housing benefit should be taken out of the hands of local authorities, and instead paid out by social security offices along with income support. Today's very complicated payment rates, which depend on the tenant's rent level, family circumstances, and the type of property occupied, would be replaced by a uniform benefit for all low paid people. The report's author, Dr Peter King of De Montfort University in Leicester, says that perhaps £350 million in administrative costs and payment errors could be saved by these simplifications alone.

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Urban Road Pricing

A series of factsheets that examine the need, and methods of implementation, for urban road user charging.

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Public, Private and People

Despite a supportive government and half a century of above inflation inflation increases, the National Health Service is still under strain. In the past few weeks alone, doctors have criticised it for long waiting times, diagnostic mistakes and it's poor record of treating heart disease, cancer and other serious diseases. Everyone accepts that we need to upgrade and modernise UK healthcare. But to do that most effectively we must develop a wider involvement in the process, with real partnerships between the NHS, the private sector and the patients themselves.

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The Next Leaders?

University students spend more on drink and on entertainment than on tuition fees, and twice as much on clothes as on books, according to this MORI survey. But they do not tolerate intolerance in their friends, and think that their investment in education will help them far more than any UK or EU government initiative.

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The Stakeholder Protection Account

With public budgets tight and negative incentives a concern, government is keen to focus its help on the most needy, letting others carry more of their own burden. This may be the start of a third way for welfare, in which individuals themselves are expected to take on more responsibility for insurable risks presently covered by the state. There is wide experience to draw on, both from within the uk and abroad, of how private insurance can take up some of the strain and tailor a better service to today's more diverse population.

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