2018 Standard Civil Contract: Discrimination Category of Law Note: Published for completeness, see description for details

The Legal Aid Agency (“LAA”) has awarded authorisation under the 2018 Standard Civil Contract to two providers. As a result, these providers will be able to undertake face to face Contract Work in the Discrimination Category of Law from 1 April 2021. Background In the Frequently Asked Questions published as part of its recent procurement process for 2021 Civil Legal Advice (“CLA”) contracts, the LAA confirmed that CLA providers wishing to conduct Licenced Work may refer cases to themselves provided they hold a 2018 Standard Civil Contract which authorises them to carry out Licenced Work in the relevant Category of Law. It was identified that two organisations that were successful in tendering for a 2021 CLA contract were holders of a 2018 Standard Civil Contract but did not have authorisation to undertake work in the Discrimination Category of Law. This meant they would not automatically be able to self-refer CLA clients requiring Licenced Work. The CLA contracts held by these two organisations were awarded in 2018. At that time CLA provided the mandatory gateway to Discrimination advice, meaning that the CLA service was the only route to legally aided Discrimination advice. Their CLA contracts therefore permitted the full range of Controlled and Licensed Work (and face to face advice where appropriate). However, since the government announced in 2019 that it would be removing the mandatory telephone gateway, the LAA have sought to align former gateway Categories, including Discrimination, with other CLA Categories that were not subject to the mandatory telephone gateway. CLA specialist telephone advice contracts let after 2019, including those awarded as a result of the procurement process for 2021 CLA contracts, have therefore permitted Controlled Work only. In 2019, the LAA also ran a procurement to re-introduce contracts for face to face Discrimination advice under the 2018 Standard Civil Contract. The LAA has accepted that current CLA providers that were awarded a CLA contract in 2018 were in a unique position of potentially not having fully understood the impact of the 2019 contracting approach on any future CLA contract for which they tendered. Contract work awarded So that providers in this unique position were not adversely affected as a result, the LAA has awarded authorisation under the 2018 Standard Civil Contract to include authorisation to undertake Discrimination Contract Work. This award means that providers will be authorised to undertake Discrimination Contract Work in accordance with the 2018 Standard Civil Contract at the office from which they also deliver Discrimination advice under the 2021 CLA contract. Common with other Discrimination providers delivering advice under the 2018 Standard Civil Contract, providers have been awarded: • Authorisation to begin up to 100 Matter Starts per Contract Year (pro rated to 42 Matter Starts for the current Contract Year which ends on 31 August 2021); • Licensed Work authorisation; • Schedule Authorisation; and • Authorisation to use Delegated Functions. The authorisation will take effect on 1 April 2021, to align with the service commencement date for the 2021 CLA contract and will expire at the same time as other categories delivered under the 2018 Standard Civil Contract. Contract documents 2018 Standard Civil Contract documentation is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/standard-civil-contract-2018