Local Authorities And Legal Aid

Those who were at Brodies' Local Government conference last month might remember that one of the cases covered in our case round-up was Glasgow City Council v Scottish Legal Aid Board and PQ [2017] CSOH 155. This was a challenge by Glasgow City Council to SLAB's decision to grant legal aid for two appeals to the Inner House of the Court of Session against decisions of the Lord Ordinary on two petitions for judicial review.

The challenge

The challenge centred on the information made available to the Council by SLAB for the purpose of making representations on the legal aid applications. The only material made available to the Council by SLAB was a very brief statutory statement by the applicant that the Lord Ordinary had erred in law in refusing the petitions. As the applicant had not consented to circulating the more detailed...