The short answer
Legal aid has a vocabulary of its own, and a lot of it is doing real work rather than being jargon for its own sake. The five worth knowing before any conversation with a provider are scope, means, merits, contribution and the statutory charge. Get those five straight and most of the rest follows.
Key points
- Scope is whether your kind of case can be funded at all.
- Means is whether you can afford to pay.
- Merits is whether the case is worth funding.
- A contribution is paid while the case runs. The statutory charge is recovered at the end. They are not the same thing.
The terms, A to Z
- Capital
- Everything you own that could be turned into money: savings, investments, valuable items, and equity in property. Assessed in every legal aid case, whatever benefits you receive. More.
- Certificate
- The document confirming legal aid has been granted for representation, and setting out exactly what work it covers. Work outside its scope is not funded.
- Contribution
- Where legal aid pays for your case but you pay part of it yourself. Mediation has never been contributory. The current position.
- Controlled work
- Work a provider can authorise itself under its contract, without asking the Legal Aid Agency first. Legal Help and family mediation are controlled work, which is why a mediator can usually tell you the answer at the MIAM.
- Disposable income
- Your income after tax, national insurance, housing costs up to a cap, and fixed allowances for a partner and each dependant. Not what is left in your account at the end of the month.
- Disregard
- An amount left out of the assessment. The important ones are the £100,000 for assets in dispute, the equity disregard on your home, and the sliding scale for people aged 60 or over.
- Domestic abuse gateway
- The route back into legal aid for private family cases where abuse can be evidenced. The accepted evidence.
- Exceptional Case Funding
- Funding for a case that is out of scope, where refusing it would breach your human rights. Rare and hard to obtain, but real.
- Family Help (Lower and Higher)
- Levels of funding between initial advice and full representation. Lower covers negotiation; Higher covers work within issued proceedings short of a final contested hearing.
- FL401
- The application form for a non-molestation order or an occupation order. There is no court fee for it.
- Help with Family Mediation
- Funding for a solicitor to advise alongside mediation and to turn a mediated agreement into a consent order. Requires at least one actual mediation session; a MIAM alone is not enough. More.
- Help with Fees
- A separate scheme from legal aid that reduces or removes the fee to issue a court application. Different test, different form. More.
- LASPO
- The Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012, which took most private family law out of scope on 1 April 2013. What it changed.
- Legal Aid Agency
- The executive agency of the Ministry of Justice that administers legal aid. It replaced the Legal Services Commission in 2013. You never apply to it directly; you apply through a contracted provider.
- Legal Help
- The lowest level of solicitor funding: initial advice and assistance, letters and negotiation, but no court representation.
- Licensed or certificated work
- Work the Legal Aid Agency must authorise before it starts, as opposed to controlled work. Full representation is licensed work, which is why it takes longer.
- Means test
- The financial assessment: gross income, disposable income and capital. All three must be inside the limits. More.
- Mediation voucher
- A government contribution of up to £500 per family towards mediation about child arrangements. Not means tested. Not legal aid. More.
- Merits test
- Whether the case is worth funding: prospects of success, and whether what you might gain justifies the cost. More.
- MIAM
- Mediation Information and Assessment Meeting. The first appointment, where a mediator explains the options and assesses whether mediation is suitable. Is it covered?
- Passporting benefit
- A benefit that gets you through the income test automatically. In practice now Universal Credit or Pension Credit guarantee credit. It does not passport the capital test. More.
- Provider
- A firm or service holding a contract with the Legal Aid Agency. Only a provider can take legally aided work.
- Scope
- Whether your kind of case is one legal aid can pay for at all. A separate question from whether you can afford a lawyer.
- SMOD
- Subject matter of the dispute. The rule that lets up to £100,000 of an asset you are actually arguing about be ignored in the capital assessment. More.
- Statutory charge
- How the Legal Aid Agency recovers what it spent, out of money or property you keep at the end of a funded case. It never applies to family mediation. It often does apply to solicitor funding.