REPORTS last week that 120 publicly funded solicitors’ firms have been overcharging the Legal Services Commission (LSC) for asylum and immigration work made depressing reading.

Reports of this kind do little to help the majority of asylum lawyers, who are dedicated to doing a difficult job well. Clearly the system is not perfect, but the Law Society of England and Wales and the LSC are cracking down on those who abuse the system. Legal aid has long been the cinderella of public services and an Aunt Sally for many in politics and the press. Asylum and immigration lawyers — and their clients — have probably been more unfairly criticised than anyone else.

Asylum and immigration stir strong emotions. Their social, political and economic implications are profound. All the more reason, therefore, that the political debate be conducted on the facts. At present, there are too many myths around — myths that are the enemy of good policy-making. They come in many shapes and sizes, but here are three of the most common.

Myth 1: The number of asylum-seekers is spiralling out of control.

The reality? The latest figures show that the number of applications in the last quarter (8,940) is down 44 per cent on the same period last year.

Myth 2: Lawyers are growing fat on advising asylum-seekers, with some cases costing tens or hundreds of thousands of pounds.

The reality? In the average asylum case, a lawyer can claim up to £286.75 for providing legal help. After that point, the lawyer needs the LSC’s permission to make any additional expenditure. The small number of well publicised, very high-cost cases is therefore untypical.

Myth 3: Nothing is being done about corrupt and incompetent lawyers and legal advisers who have been touting for business and fleecing vulnerable people.

The reality? As the regulator of solicitors, the Law Society is extremely keen to make sure that asylum and immigration solicitors uphold the highest possible standards. There is no disguising that there have been problems of abuse, but over the past few months we have made strenuous efforts to crack down on those firms that have been taking advantage of the system.

The measures introduced include spotchecks of law firms carrying out immigration work and the formation of a specialist immigration team to respond to complaints about asylum or immigration solicitors and identify remedies.

We are working with the Immigration Services Commissioner and the Home Office to see what further practical steps can be taken to combat touting.

Working closely with the commission, we are introducing an immigration accreditation scheme. In future, all legal aid advisers working in this area will have to be accredited, thereby introducing more robust quality control. Without accreditation, they will not be able to give advice or be paid for doing so from public money.

Where we can improve the professionalism of that advice we will, and where we can identify problems we will tackle them. It was reported last week that the LSC will be setting up a public immigration and asylum service pilot scheme, based in Birmingham and opening this autumn, to give it a direct idea of the real cost of immigration and asylum legal aid, as well as to identify inefficiencies and pressures and best practice.

The Law Society supports the commission’s decision to run this pilot scheme — provided that individual clients have a free choice of the commission’s service and private practice firms. There must be robust measures in place to monitor the quality of advice and cost and we will be looking for guarantees that advisers are independent and not influenced by government. We will be interested to see the results of the scheme, but will be surprised if the commission is able to provide good quality advice at a lower price than the best firms of solicitors.

No one is pretending that asylum and immigration do not give rise to serious issues or that there have not been problems in the system. But equally we should not pretend that the asylum system is out of control or that lawyers are somehow bringing it into disrepute.

We need an asylum system that is fair, consistent, humane and swift. That is the responsibility of the Government. We need to approach it with an open mind, and be prepared to move if there are ways in which public confidence in the system can be strengthened. But the debate must be based on facts. Some of the myths being spread are not just the enemy of good policy-making, they also stand in the way of humanity, decency and tolerance.

The author is the chief executive of the Law Society

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