Am I eligible for legal aid?

What legal aid still covers

Since the 2012 reforms, whole areas came out of scope, and the ones that remain are mostly where liberty, safety or a home is at stake. The categories gov.uk lists as covered include:

• Housing, where the issue is homelessness, eviction, losing your home, or serious disrepair
• Protection from abuse or harassment, including forced marriage
• Child protection, where a child in your family is at risk of being taken into care
• Family mediation, for example when deciding child arrangements
• Asylum, and cases involving victims of human trafficking
• Mental health, and detention under the Mental Health Act
• Care quality, where poor care relates to age, disability or special educational needs
• Inquests, for advice where a family member’s death goes to a coroner
• Debt, where your home is at risk
• Discrimination

Ordinary divorce, most financial disputes, most employment claims, most personal injury and most contract disputes are out of scope. Some remain available in exceptional cases where refusing would breach human rights, but that is an application in itself.

Income and capital limits

Two thresholds, and both apply.

Test	The usual limit
Income	Joint monthly income of £2,657 or less, before tax and other deductions
Capital	Assets of £8,000 or less, held by you and your partner

Equity in your home above £100,000 counts as an asset, and equity means the current value less the outstanding mortgage. Savings, investments and valuable possessions count too.

Two things soften those figures. Receiving income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance or income-related Employment and Support Allowance satisfies the income test on its own. And some cases qualify whatever your financial circumstances, including certain child protection matters, so the means test is not always the barrier it appears to be.

Where your income or capital is above the limit, some case types still allow eligibility, and gov.uk runs an eligibility checker that applies the current rules to your figures. It is worth ten minutes before assuming the answer.

Finding a solicitor with a legal aid contract

Qualifying is one thing. Finding a firm with a legal aid contract in your category and area is the part that stops people.

Most firms do not hold a contract. Those that do hold them for specific categories, so a firm with a housing contract cannot take your family case on legal aid. In some regions and categories the number of contracted providers is very small, and waiting lists follow.

Practical steps:

• Search by category and postcode on the government’s find a legal aid adviser service rather than calling firms at random.
• Ask the firm directly whether it holds a current contract in your category, not whether it does legal aid work generally.
• Ask a law centre or Citizens Advice, which know which local firms still hold contracts.
• Start early. A deadline plus a search for a contracted firm is a bad combination.

The city lists on this site flag the firms that still do publicly funded work, which is now unusual enough to be worth noting. David Gray in Newcastle and Bhatia Best in Nottingham are two of them.

Exceptional case funding for cases out of scope

Where a case is out of scope, funding can still be granted if refusing it would breach your human rights or your rights under retained EU law. That is exceptional case funding, and it is an application in its own right, made to the Legal Aid Agency with reasons.

It is used most often in inquests, immigration cases outside the main categories, and some family cases involving vulnerable applicants. Grant rates have historically been low, and applications are more likely to succeed when a solicitor or a specialist charity prepares them. It is worth asking about where the case involves someone who cannot represent themselves.

What to bring to the first appointment

Bring the paperwork, because eligibility is assessed on evidence rather than on what you say.

• Income. Recent payslips, or benefit award letters, for you and your partner.
• Capital. Bank statements, savings, and a mortgage statement if you own a home.
• The case. Court papers, letters from the other side, and any deadline you have been given.
• Identification. Photographic identification and proof of address.

The firm runs the means assessment against the current thresholds and tells you whether you qualify, whether a contribution applies, and what the statutory charge might mean for you. If you do not qualify, ask what the same work costs privately, because for some pieces of work the gap is smaller than people expect.

Contributions and the statutory charge

It is not always free. Depending on income and capital you may be asked to pay a monthly contribution towards the cost of your case.

Separately, where legal aid helps you recover money or property, or keep property that was in dispute, the statutory charge can require the costs to be repaid out of what you recovered. In a family case that often means a charge over a house. It is not a reason to refuse legal aid, but it is a reason to ask the firm to explain the charge in writing before the work starts.

Options if you do not qualify

Three routes are worth checking before paying privately.

• Existing insurance. Home, motor and credit card policies, and trade union membership, frequently include legal expenses cover that few people remember holding.
• Fixed fees. For a defined piece of work, a fixed price from a firm is often less than people expect, and asking the right questions on the first call is what gets you one.
• Free advice. Law centres, university law clinics, Citizens Advice and the Bar’s pro bono unit each cover different ground.

Legal aid in Scotland and Northern Ireland

Scotland runs its own system through the Scottish Legal Aid Board, with its own income and capital tests and a wider civil scope in some areas than England and Wales. Advice and assistance, civil legal aid and criminal legal aid are separate schemes with separate tests.

Northern Ireland runs its own through the Legal Services Agency Northern Ireland, again with its own tests and scope. The figures on this page do not apply in either country, so a firm on the Glasgow or Belfast lists will work to different thresholds.