ON MONDAY night, BBC’s Panorama aired ‘DIY Justice’, which detailed the problems that many parents, family members, family lawyers, the courts, and other professionals have experienced since the cuts to civil legal aid were brought in on April 1, 2013.

The Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 (‘LASPO’) drastically cut the availability of legal aid in most family cases (as well as other areas of our civil law) so that unless you have (the very strictly defined) proof that you were the victim of domestic abuse at the hands of your opponent in the last two years, you cannot get legal aid in most family cases now, and will either have to fund your own case, or act for yourself in court.

The exceptions will be things like proceedings brought by the local authority to remove a child, or child protection cases where the local authority are involved, applications for non molestation orders where there has been domestic abuse, child abduction or unlawful retention of a child, or High Court wardship proceedings involving a child.

This has led to some very harsh situations for sometimes very vulnerable people. The programme featured a father on benefits fighting to see his child, and a mother with mental health issues seeking the return of her daughter from the paternal family.

The legal profession has many similar stories. There was a recent case involving parents with learning disabilities, having to fund their own case for the return of their child from local authority care A slight issue arose with the care of the child, and the authorities decided to remove their child and place in care.

The parents then discovered that they could not obtain legal aid, because the father was earning slightly over the income cap and they were not eligible. They were fortunate that they found a solicitor who was prepared to help them free of charge and their case is still going through the courts.

We hear almost daily stories of people who cannot obtain help to find access to justice; a wife completely housebound with multiple sclerosis living in a specially adapted home, who cannot obtain legal aid to be represented within the divorce financial application; a mother of two severely disabled sons in a similar situation; the mother who might have been the victim of serious domestic abuse more than two years ago, now faced with representing herself in court against her former partner; the grandparents who are putting themselves forward to care for a child at odds with the local authority, who are employed or own their own home and are therefore not financially eligible; a man who can barely speak or write in English who is trying to represent himself in court so that he can see his children again. The list goes on.

There is no doubt that over the last two years, many people have had their access to justice seriously undermined.